Blade
by thir13enth
Summary: Anko, still scarred from her past, is ready to take revenge against her former sensei. Kakashi still believes that he can save his former student from vengeance...but every fight is a double edged sword.
1. Chapter 1

**After many days of dormancy, Midori arises again…**

**And hopefully you will be satisfied.**

**Midori Fujiwara

* * *

**

Anko's blood boiled hot within her, surging, tasting the building power and tension at the base of her neck. The curse mark was tempting, like a sweet never tried before, only much more dangerous. As she ran, the pumping got harsher, rougher against her; pain grew harder and harder to resist. For relief, she knew that all she had to do was given in to the night and allow other powers to control her. But she had chosen long ago to suffer instead. And she had a reputation to keep up, with a goal that grew eminently less and less quixotic, and all the more possible. Besides, she had no use for his power…unless it meant stopping him.

So she grit her teeth to ignore pain and kept on running, feeling Orochimaru's presence growing stronger and her cursed seal like a magnet drawing a rush toward him. She knew she was being reckless, but she didn't give a shit. Her life was practically over, and she wasn't looking forward to anything in particular.

She was only waiting for this single chance to stop a cycle that would continue if she did nothing.

Anko began the circle of Oroochimaru's immortality, because he saw through his experiments on her how it was possible. It began with her, and she aimed to have it end with her as well.

And this was her chance…she was so close.

Adrenaline ran throughout her body and she gave a small smirk. But within that second of smile she had distracted herself, and losing her ground, fell victim to entangling white snakes.

One snake curled around her left foot, its tail rooted deep into the ground, and another's fangs pierced deep into her shin, hooking her stable and half-paralyzed. And the last snake, the largest, wound around her torso, confining her arms to the same space within the tightening snake's embrace.

The snake's head met with hers, and its tongue flickered at her face mockingly.

Her blood, though boiling, was frozen over within that second, and the curse mark burned ice. Horror and fear replaced the bloodlust she had.

But she couldn't let him take over her emotions like that any longer!

Despite the headstrong promises she was reciting in her head, she forgot how to stay calm when Orochimaru's voice spoke from the snake's head.

"Anko…" it muttered menacingly in that unique way he had called her with…with a tone of desire and enmity thrown in with jealousy for the juvenile body she owned.

Her name alone in his voice was successful in completely paralyzing the rest of her body.

"What a coincidence to find you here," the snake chided slowly. "It's been a long time since you've tried to find me…and come back to me."

Containing the pain and conversing with Oroochimaru left Anko sputtering in short quick bursts.

"I come…for a…different…reason now…Oroochimaru," she managed to get out.

"You don't even acknowledge me as sensei anymore…"

"I lost my respect for you…a long while ago!" Her breathing was so deep that she couldn't contain her own lungs…but the tight coils of the snake trapping her didn't allow her to breathe. Alas, she was stuck holding her breath and handling pure pain.

"I don't need your respect any longer…I can quite easily obtain others' respect…" The snake poked its head closer to her head, and its eyes turned into slits. "In fact, you're not as much value to me any longer."

Anko had already prepared some kunai blades within the sleeves of her trench coat, and she slipped the edges out. Within the split second, the snake's blood had stained her clothing, and dripped down her face.

But the snake's death was not the end of Oroochimaru.

He was still standing right in front of her, his pale old hand as a result of summoning snakes. Oroochimaru put this hand down, and put himself into an extremely vulnerable stance, reminding Anko that it would not be easy to fend off and destroy an enemy with the likes of Oroochimaru and himself.

"Fuck you," she cursed. "I will kill you in my own blooded hands one day."

Oroochimaru shrugged off her threat. "Life is too short of a time. You'll be wasting your time trying to train and defeat me. Unlike me, you have only one body within one life…unless you join my cause, I suggest taking your limited time more seriously."

"Heh," she coughed, shaking with the throbbing at her neck. "This is all I may ever live for. I grew up in your clutches, and I may die in your prison still…but…there would be nothing else for me in the meantime, correct?"

"Well if you put it that way, Anko…I can always notch up that pain you feel. I can always make my way more appealing. You will have no other choice but to release your will and give in to mine."

Anko whimpered to herself as Oroochimaru set the degree of temptation even higher. At this point, Anko had fallen to her knees, her eyes running, vision blurred. She screamed, tortured against her own will and suffering. Her body questioned itself: Why suffer hell when it can all be easily released? Give it up! The pain persuaded her body, but now, it was all mental power and will.

"Ah…my poor Anko…"Oroochimaru cooed evilly. He stepped closer and closer, one step slowly after the other, until he was kneeling in front of her. But her eyes were closed, her whole self focused on holding onto the pain, concentrating on letting herself continue to suffer against the control of Orochimaru.

"Sasuke may have been more vulnerable," she yelled incoherently. It was difficult to think when pain was distracting. "But…I can resist you!"

Oroochimaru smiled. "If only you had given in a long time ago…" Then he lifted her chin so that her tightly shut eyes were looking straight at his own. "You wouldn't be suffering from this pain."

And then from that moment on, Anko felt nothing but pain. Just when she thought she couldn't take it, and reached her tolerance, even more hell surged through her blood.

She wanted to die.

Her yells became high-pitched screams.

And the pain was so great that she let go…

"Stop it!" she cried, and she stopped resisting.

She gave in…

* * *

Breath roughly came back to her, and she sputtered for air, sitting up straight. She was relieved. The pain was gone, and she had let it go and had given in.

But how could have she?

She opened her tightly shut eyes, and stared at what was before her. Not Oroochimaru with a wide smile, but rather her own two shaking hands.

_Just a dream_, she realized. Just a dream.

Her hand clapped over the cool skin with the curse mark. It was fine, but the remnants of the dream made it feel as though it were burning.

She was displeased with herself that she had actually given up to the resistance she had held against him for so long. She was pathetic for giving in to pain.

Pain, she learned from the ANBU, is only mental. Pain was only the body's way of telling the mind it was hurt…it didn't mean anything beyond that.

And to give in against her lifelong dreams and goals…to something so insignificant…

But what bothered her the most was that even in her dreams she had given up.

What would she do in reality if her true body were to experience that hell when she would encounter Oroochimaru again?

* * *

Kakashi rarely paid any attention to the passing time, but today he stared for a long time at the calendar on the wall of his room, after flipping it a few pages to reach the current month.

_This month, _Kakashi realized. The time is closing in soon…

He tore his eyes off and slipped on his Konoha vest, securing the forehead protector over the Sharingan eyes before stepping out to let his skin taste the fresh air.

* * *

Anko was devastated when she found that there was no food in her house to satisfy her hungry stomach. She really didn't feel like going outside, at least, not after a long dream.

She turned her head to some stale cookies left in the pantry. She'll have to do with that for now, she thought, but her hand picked it up and threw it into the garbage several yards from her. The cookies made a soft thunk and she could hear the food breaking into crumbs.

It wasn't time to be scared.

So Anko slipped her tan trench coat on and opened her door, stepping into the blinding light.

It was so bright, yet her eyes only saw darkness for the few seconds her eyes had to adapt, as if hidden within the light, there was actually a latent dark lurking.

Kurenai first noticed Anko because her clothing made herself so distinctive from the other common people. Anko entered a local grocery store, which was rare, because as Kurenai knew her, Anko would often skip regular healthy meals for a pig-out of dango. It was actually amazing how she hadn't become like Chouji yet.

Something seemed off today besides Anko's choice of food. Anko normally carried the air with energy…often "felt" by others around her. She just had that magnetic radiant personality that made everyone feel good around her. But today, Kurenai could barely notice that she even passed.

And thought Anko only talked when she had the reason to and chose her words carefully, where was the loud greeting she would have heard from Anko? Anko would have noticed Kurenai as instantly as Kurenai had noticed her. And it wasn't like Kurenai was hiding. She was plain out in the open.

Kurenai ran a list through her head. Maybe it was time for herself to get more rice…so she'd might as well go into the store with Anko.

She saw Anko standing in front of a display of baked goods. Now that was more Anko-like, but Anko wasn't picking anything up. She was simply staring at the food, when she normally was impulsive.

"Anko," Kurenai greeted, but it was difficult to start when usually Anko would begin the conversation.

"Kurenai," Anko smiled, and then lifted her head to stare once more at the food.

"Can't decide?"

Anko shrugged. "There are so many that are so good. I'm not sure where to start." Anko smiled, "Which would you choose?"

"Why, can't decide for yourself today?" Kurenai questioned, studying her friend's awkward behavior.

"No, and I need help because I'm starving," Anko answered. Her tone was playful, but Kurenai could tell she was forcing a happy personality.

Perhaps in order to hide something?

When Kurenai didn't answer, Anko seemed to play lotto with the desserts and finally asked for the daifuku. Kurenai watched Anko gratefully take the sweets and smile, not forgetting to say thanks.

Anko held the open package out to Kurenai. "Well…I chose, right? Want some?"

Kurenai reached to take one of the less good-looking ones and walked out with Anko. Anko wasn't finished with the box even five minutes of walking.

"Anko?" Kurenai asked as Anko seemed to snap back into consciousness and took a sweet for herself. But Anko reeled just as quickly back into her thoughts, chewing slowly.

Kurenai noticed that she had already eaten more than half of what Anko had purchased. If things had gone as normally, Anko should have been fighting Kurenai for the last piece already.

"Anko," Kurenai repeated. "What's bothering you?"

Anko's eyebrows furrowed. "It was just a very freaky dream I had." Anko picked up another daifuku and popped it into her mouth as if to feign that everything was running normally as expected to be.

"Expand," Kurenai said.

Anko made a slight face of disgust. "Actually…I don't really want to. It was kind of…erotic about a guy, and I'm just really bothered." Anko gave Kurenai a grin. "Guess my hormones are up. Don't worry about it, okay?"

Here, Anko waved a quick goodbye salut and turned a corner.

Kurenai would have followed her, but decided to let Anko get away with the lie.

Anko still had uneaten food left.

Kurenai was right in suspecting something. Ah…but she had tried her best to hide it! Anko guessed she wasn't a good actor. More than once people acknowledged how easily her face could read like a book.

Anko had lost her appetite even before she was done chewing the first daifuku. She had just and still felt so out of place.

_But it's just a dream, _she told herself. _Today's a day like any other._

Anko's unconscious memory suddenly lit up, however. While at the bakery she had noticed the calendar. She hadn't instantly realized but now…

"Shit," she said to herself.

Anko grabbed her box of daifuku and stuffed one into her mouth as she stepped out the door.

* * *

Fortunately, Anko didn't have to go through the trouble to actually awaken Lady Tsunade, but unfortunately the Hokage was still angry from before when someone else had awoken her.

She stepped up to Tsunade's desk.

Tsunade burned lasers through her.

"Another early bird," the Hokage stated sternly.

"Um…would you like a sweet, Tsunade-sama?" Anko offerend, hoping to get on her better side.

What she came for required an open mind.

Tsunade's eyes glared fire. "What do you want, Anko?" But in any case, Tsunade still reached for a daifuku.

"I…uh…"Anko started, realizing she hadn't prepared what she would say beforehand. A stupid move at that. "I want to open another mission…"

"Of what type?"

"Uh…rather more like a second attempt at something." Anko forced a cheeky smile.

Tsunade's eyes narrowed when she made the connection. "Retrive Uchiha Sasuke?"

Anko nodded. "Hai…along those lines."

"These types of mission are cost more than they return…unless you add in future expenses," Tsunade leaned back into her chair, and her eyes softened some. "I understand your concern around this time, but I…" Tsunade stopped.

Anko realized Tsunade disapproved, though Tsunade didn't seem to want to say it and seem selfish. But Anko knew Tsunade's side of the argument very well.

It was probably already too late to retrieve him by now.

Hell, the chance to save the Uchiha boy may have been missed already, considering how cautious Oroochimaru was in his planning. Anko knew this all too well.

Tsunade stood up slowly and looked out the window, her back to Anko.

"In reality," Tsunade said after a while. "Today is just another normal day. The sun has risen, and night did not prolong for more than it should have."

Anko stood her ground. She had to at least have Tsunade recognize her side of the argument as well. Or better yet, allow her to assemble a group of jounin to accompany her. "But you never know, Tsunade-sama, if tomorrow will be the same way."

Tsunade didn't look away from the window. "Shizune," she said to the lady who had stood silently since Anko had entered. "Check that no one is overhearing."

"Will do," Shizune replied, closing the door behind her.

Tsunade turned to face Anko again. "Actually, Kakashi stopped by earlier this morning to request the same thing."

Anko took this as an answer learning to an eventual 'no'.

"But, I understand Kakashi's immediate concern, as Sasuke's previous sensei. You, on the other hand have never truly interacted with Sasuke. What are you truly planning?" Tsunade challenged.

"I…it's not really Sasuke…I'm sorry," Anko apologized. "But I want to stop Oroochimaru. Myself. And I can empathize with Sasuke. I feel as though it is my duty to put an end to the cycle."

"Put it that way, and you're really requesting a mission. You're requesting permission for independent leave," Tsunade corrected her.

Anko stood wordless. That was true, but both females knew very well that Anko didn't have the capability to destroy Oroochimaru on her own.

Anko looked down.

Tsunade held the silence as well, before Anko said one of the most difficult things she had to say in a long while.

"I know I won't be able to defeat him…but I want to show him the anger that he had always wanted to see in me…and I'll die…knowing I settled that with him."

Tsunade took a deep breath before speaking. "That sounds so noble, but really you're just being selfish. You know that I am completely responsible for your death?" Tsunade said this more like a statement Anko should have already known rather than a question. "At dangerous times like these, I will be no doubt punished for letting the life of one more jounin go."

Anko bit her lip. "And what did you answer to Kakashi's request?"

"I told him the exact same thing," Tsunade's voice quieted however, as though she was about to cry. "Listen. I would love for me to be able to let anyone go to retrieve Sasuke, or attempt to stop Oroochimaru, but…" Tsunade trailed off and let her sentence blank, as if she was searching for the right words.

But Tsunade failed to find them.

"Leave, Anko," she said instead.

* * *

Kurenai was surprised to see Anko again, but this time at her door.

Anko was still holding a few sweets that she _still_ hadn't eaten.

"Are you here to tell the truth?" Kurenai asked as she stepped to the side to let Anko into her apartment.

"Tell me Kurenai: Would you choose Asuma over Konoha?"

Kurenai, bewildered by such a random question, shot back, "What are you asking, Anko? What does any of this have to do with me? Just tell me what's wrong! I've been worried to _hell_ about you!"

"It's a simple question, Kurenai. If you had to prove to Asume that you love him, would you betray Konoha if you had to?" Anko snapped back.

Kurenai had rarely encountered an angry Anko and struggled to find the answer that Anko would probably be satisfied with. "Yes," Kurenai said.

"Hn," Anko said, smirking.

"Anko! What are you planning—"

"Kurenai…I'm going to search out Oroochimaru. I will murder him," Anko declared, bloodlust flickering in her eyes.

Kurenai didn't want to investigate what Anko was imagining. "Anko…you're going to die…and you're leaving Konoha?" Kurenai put some pieces of Anko's thought puzzle together. "Without consent?"

"Yes, I will die, and yes I'm leaving Konoha _tonight_," Anko stated. "So, I'm just going to—"

"Anko! Have you gone out of your mind?"

Anko smiled. "More than once." When she didn't see any change in Kurenai's concerned and outraged countenance, she added, "But you couldn't possibly understand." She was slightly discouraged by the fact that Kurenai wasn't being as supportive of her as she had always had been.

"I won't and will never understand, but I know that as a friend, I'm not going to allow you to throw your life away like that!"

"But just like you want to prove you love Asuma, I want to prove to Oroochimaru that I hate him. He wants to see the depth of my hatred, so be it! I still haven't forgiven him. And if I'm lucky, I want my face to be last one he sees before he burns in hell!"

"You've already proven your hate to him from the Chuunin exams that other year," Kurenai said stiffly.

"But it's just not the same way any longer!" Anko suddenly couldn't explain her spontaneous desire to kill Oroochimaru. "I just _have _to step him before he takes another body and form all together. Otherwise, he will continue to haunt this world even long after our children are dead. What difference is between the life and future generations to come? Hell! That child you and Asuma might plan to have…you don't want your child to be a target of Oroochimaru!"

"Shut up!" Kurenai yelled, aware that Anko had hit a very sensitive part of her emotions and conscience, bringing up the subject of the next generation. The two women didn't change their composure but allowed their breath to calm down.

After the silence, Kurenai asked in a soft voice, "Is this what bothered you all morning?"

Anko nodded, ready for another verbal attack, eyebrows still knitted.

Kurenai looked at the base of Anko's neck, at the curse mark that Anko's trench coat covered.

"Anko…I don't know what to say. I…could only hope that he could be defeated…you can't throw your life like that. There are…people who'd hate to attend your funeral."

Anko suddenly remembered how Lady Tsunade had called her selfish though apparently noble in her actions.

Anko felt a hard bulge in her throat begin to form. "I have to and I don't care. I _know_ I'll die but my life has been leading up to this very point and I don't know what else I would be doing with my life."

Kurenai stood, quiet.

Anko bit her lip. "I'm sorry."

Kurenai's eyes closed, and Anko noticed flashes of light that reflected from her fallen tears. Anko could feel herself about to cry as well.

"But you'll…you understand…at least a bit right? It's not that I hate Konoha…and it's not like I want to commit suicide because I just don't care anymore…it's…"

Kurenai nodded when Anko trailed off, unable to express herself.

Anko felt extremely guilty. She had emotionally affected a lot of people today…already.

And at her funeral? What would happen then?

Anko had never looked at it that way before, and she was realizing more and more how stupid she was acting.

But the pulses of pain that swept into reality from her dreams were calling her stronger than what made sense.

She could have just stopped there and retreated home to rest so that she could recover sanely, but she had already said her words.

And it was too late to go back on them.

* * *

**I don't know about you guys but as I was typing the first section of this I originally spelled Orochimaru with an extra O, like this: Oroochimaru. But then after some looking around on Fanfiction, apparently everyone spells it with only one O. Hm…I don't know where I got that extra O from.**

**In any case, that doesn't matter. What matters to me are your opinions. This is what I **_**live**_** for. Well not exactly, but the fact that I'm posting this in the first place means something. Criticism very well accepted and compliments are great too! Review please! I beg you and offer cookies!**

**Reawakened,  
****Midori Fujiwara**


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks for the support! I know some of you have been waiting a while...-_- blame Procrastination.**

**Midori Fujiwara**

* * *

"Hey, Sai!" Naruto yelled, coming toward him.

"Hi," Sai replied as enthusiastically as he could manage, a fail in that sense. He put down his brush to lay across the ink bottle, to show Naruto that he had acknowledged him.

"You wanna see some awesome technique that I discovered?" Naruto asked. He was grinning quite broadly and Sai didn't know what to make of such a big smile.

Little did he know Naruto was up to some mischief and tricks.

_When someone tries to impress you, it is because that someone wants you to get to know him or her better, _Sai recalled from his book. _It is important to accept the other person's talent so that closer bonding can be made. Otherwise, without appreciating the other person, you are implying you want no more interaction with the other._

"Sure Naruto," Sai said, also remembering to leave off the name title. He smiled, hoping that he had used the right muscles to do so. Last time he had attempted to smile without concentrating on the specific muscles, he had made Sakura angry.

"_Idiot! Don't pucker your lips like you're about to kiss me or something!"_ she had said.

Then, as expected, Sakura slapped him straight across the face.

Sai was sent flying to the wall several meters away.

That hurt a lot, and Sai learned his lesson very well.

He smiled, but Naruto didn't seem to react weirdly so Sai suspected that he had targeted the right facial muscles.

In another book, he had studied that to appreciate or acknowledge someone, he must clap his hands after the performance and shout for an encore. So, Sai got ready to clap his hands.

Naruto put his hands together in the same way he would to create mass shadow clones.

"Ready, Sai? Here I go! Sexy Ninja Harem Tech—!"

"Naruto!" Sakura yelled, clobbering him within that second. "You pervert! You're worse than Kakashi-sensei!"

"But…but Sakura-chan…"

"What do you think you're doing anyway, showing this to Sai?" Sakura continued to rage.

Sai didn't know what was going on, but apparently the performance had ended.

He clapped his hands and yelled, "Again! Again!"

Sakura looked defeated all of a sudden. _Even he has no clue what's going on, _she thought. She stood back up, an evil look on her face. "Alright then, Sai. Again?" And she pulled back her fist.

Sai looked puzzled. Now what? Sai mentally sighed. One day he would be able to go a whole day without consulting the book. He'd have to study harder if he were to do that though.

"No! Sakura-chan, no! Not again!" Naruto exclaimed, hopping up to his feet and attempting to scramble away. Sakura quickly halted him. "Sai has no idea what he's doing! Ah! Have mercy, Sakura-chan!"

Sai thought for a moment. "No, I don't know what I'm doing," he agreed truthfully. Then he blinked. Then he smiled.

_Smiles get you out of uncomfortable or difficult situations._

Sakura rolled her eyes and chucked Naruto to theground.

Sai didn't know how to explain it, but whenever Sakura got into her aggressive and violent mode, she was quite…terrifying.

"But what were you doing using that technique on Sai anyway?" Sakura asked.

"Well…he did say that he had no emotions or feelings so I just wanted to see if when he saw a naked girl he would—"

"Baka Naruto!" Sakura beat him back down to the ground again. "But you know…that _is _an interesting question."

"Sakura-chan…why do you have to beat me up then?" Naruto moaned, falling to the ground, clutching his throbbing head.

Sakura ignored Naruto. "Say Sai," she called and sat down next to him.

Sai turned his head.

"When you see someone…like a girl…has your heart ever beat really hard?" Sakura asked.

"Yeah! And your pants get tight?" Naruto leapt up from quick recovery.

"Naruto," Sakura growled.

"Forget what I said…" Naruto said, laying back down in the dirt again.

Sai thought for a moment. "Yes," he answered.

"Really? Like when?" Sakura asked, suddenly extremely attentive.

Sai thought back to when Sakura was clobbering Naruto a moment before. His heart was pounding then…right?

Sai looked up again, clueless.

"Who did you see?" Sakura clarified.

"You," Sai said truthfully.

Sakura froze.

Naruto got up in bewilderment. "What?"

"Huh?" Si asked. He had stated the fact…what was wrong?

But little did Sai know the difference between arousal and fear.

"Oh that's it, Sai! Now it's you versus me!" Naruto steamed up.

_When a friend wants to fight you, do not fight but first find out why there is aggression and from there, try to eliminate it, _Sai recalled from page 174 of his book.

"Why?" Sai asked, henceforth.

Naruto didn't get what was up with Sai and he got frustrated as well as very angry.

"Because…because—"

"Wow, Naruto, take it easy," Kakashi's voice cut in from out of nowhere. He placed his hand on Naruto's head, as if to keep the balloon head of anger down. "You haven't treated anyone this aggressively since Sasuke."

Instantly, Kakashi regretted mentioning Sasuke.

Sai noticed how everyone's heads went down when Sasuke's name was suddenly mentioned. How great would that bond be? How big would this friendship look? Sai continued to observe.

"Kakashi-sensei…when do you think Lady Tsunade will be calling another attempt to retrieve Sasuke?" Sakura asked.

Kakashi took his hand off Naruto's head and placed both hands into his pockets. "I can't say," he said. "I have no idea."

Naruto's eyebrows furrowed. "Isn't it…almost time?"

"Soon," Kakashi said distantly, looking off into the landscape.

* * *

The familiar sound of shuriken clashing together in her pocket helped Anko feel a little more comfortable. Reaching into her shelf, she stuffed a few more scrolls into the inside lining of her trench coat.

Anko grabbed some more kunai, sliding three each inside the hidden compartments of her sleeves, one on her waist, and another few in yet another pocket alongside the shuriken.

Anko whirled around, testing if any metallic sounds would be made if she moved. Only a soft whish of clothing was heard, so she was satisfied with the almost complete sound invisibility she owned….despite the extra ten or twenty pounds of weapon she carried.

Anko put her hands on her hips, smirking and taking a last glance at her room. She plucked a few needles and tucked those behind her shin plates.

She took a blank scroll of paper and brush in case she ran out of scrolls.

Anko checked outside the window. The trees were bending right, which meat the wind was coming down from the north. That was perfect for Anko, who had to get past the night shift ANBU to get out of Konoha. As a former ANBU member, she had an advantage because she was aware of all the hidden tricks throughout the village but then again, plans were constantly changed so things may have changed.

But hopefully not so much that she'd fail to even get out of Konoha without even getting the chance to get close enough to feel the pulse of pain from the cursemark when Orochimaru was there.

Anko went through a list of things to bring and things to remember a second time, though normally she did not take plans and didn't go through check-ups on her equipment usually. But this 'mission' was on a completely different scale

She had never actually planned the date; she just had to leave today because she was afraid of whatever else she would have dreamt that night.

Anko quickly created a single shadow clone of herself. She faced her reflection, noticing just how tiny she looked.

She faced a hard fact.

She wouldn't be able to defeat Orochimaru and had no chance to do so whatsoever.

Anko turned around, taking a last look at the gates of the Hidden Leaf Village.

This would be her last time seeing her home…

She turned around however, and kept her mind empty as ANBU had trained her to do.

Anko put her hands into her pockets and began to slowly walk off.

She didn't quite know where she was going, but from the news she had heard, there were only a few more areas within Sound Country where Orochimaru would be.

She would just have to test them all, stopping one hideout after the other as rest stops.

Her clone would give the illusion that she was still in Konoha, and she trusted Kurenai would keep Anko covered.

In any case she just had to find Orochimaru.

Whipping out a kunai, she held it in front of her face.

A metal clink of two weapons startled the silent night.

_Damn, _Anko thought. _Already?

* * *

_

**Shorter chapter than before, but I couldn't find a better place to stop. Well then, don't forget to review!**

**Ever enthusiastic et erring evanescence,**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	3. Chapter 3

Anko was extremely disappointed when she realized that she'd be using some chakra already, but it wasn't like she wasn't expecting a fight leaving Konoha at all. It was just the thought that she'd have to rest the remaining night following battle in order to completely recover for her journey. She'd rather use jutsus and make the fight fast than to get injured using taijutsu, a form of fighting she wasn't too fond of at all.

And apparently, her opponent had a pretty good handle at close combat. She concluded this after punching into the air a couple of times, even when she was sure that her aim would have landed.

Anko took several steps back, practically stumbling, and fell into a horse stance, swiping her kunai behind her to ensure her competitor hadn't stepped behind her.

The action stopped for those few moments, and she used that time to observe the shadowed surroundings around her. She saw the silhouette of her fighter in the distance, but the lack of moonlight and numerous tree shadows gave her a blurred black shape.

There.

Ducking under some shuriken, Anko quickly summoned a few snakes, which extended from the sleeves from her trench coat. Twin snakes quickly looped their way around her opponent's body. Following capture, which told her that this figure was no genjutsu, she lifted the opponent's body up into the air about twenty feet above the ground.

The opponent apparently used some kind of a fire-based jutsu, which allowed a small stream of orange heat to flicker out into the night air. But that was all the opponent had to do to cease the fight altogether.

"Kakashi?" she exclaimed.

"Anko?" But obviously Kakashi was more surprised than Anko he had absolutely no idea that she had met with the Hokage after him for the same purpose.

Anko quickly withdrew her snakes, accidently forgetting to drop him to the ground before doing so.

Kakashi kissed the dirt following under the force of gravity. "Why are _you _out here?"

"Finding Orochimaru to kill him," Anko answered bluntly, watching him stand up and brush dust off his clothing. "Lady Tsunade already told me about your mission request. She denied mine as well."

Kakashi didn't seem too surprised, thought he couldn't have imagined more of a coincidence. "Then we're just going the same way," he concluded.

Anko aggressively put her right arm around his shoulders, almost breaking his neck. Pulling their heads together and forcing a smile, she said, "Well then, we'll just be team members while taking this illegal mission and become missing rogue nin together!"

"At least I have a better chance of being successful," Kakashi said dryly.

Anko got ticked off and pushed him away from her. "It's either me or him." She continued to walk down the receding path, stopping in front of the invisible chakra barrier that was set around the village. She put her hands up in preparation for a jutsu. "Did you leave a clone behind?" Anko asked him, not looking behind her.

"No," Kakashi answered and simply walked past. After a few steps, he turned to look back at her. "What happened, Anko?" he mocked. "Not telling anyone you left and replaced yourself with a fake?"

Anko snarled. "Shut it, I wasn't expecting anyone else or any peer pressure."

Kakashi shrugged. "Lady Tsunade would have found out anyway."

Anko didn't like the idea of making it obvious to everyone that she had left. She had planned things so that she'd be long far off before Konoha troops could bring her back and cancel her self-induced mission altogether.

"Well?" Kakashi looked to the side. "You're wasting my time." And he began to walk off again.

How typical of Kakashi: changing everyone's carefully thought-out plans. Just like he always was. Impulsive yet laid-back. And damn good at it, too.

"I didn't know you were that risky," Anko said finally, stepping out to catch up to Kakashi, not performing the pass-through seal to cross the Konoha chakra barrier.

Anko hadn't wanted anyone to come with her originally, but apparently Kakashi had decided to take the same actions she had.

_Whatever_, she thought.

A little company was good.

"Just don't get in the way, alright?" Anko threatened Kakashi. "Orochimaru is mine. All _mine._"

* * *

**Well, I had originally planned for Kakashi to meet up with Anko more towards the end right before an encounter with Orochimaru…or even during, but I changed my mind so that there would be more…how do I explain…**_**stuff**_** instead of just Anko's point of view all the time until Kakashi comes in randomly and all that.**

**So hopefully that didn't ruin too much.**

**In any case that was another ridiculously short chapter…I'm probably just unconsciously doing that so I have less work to do…Reviews please! (Perhaps my effort and efficiency correlates with the number of reviews I receive…)**

**-Midori Fujiwara**


	4. Chapter 4

**Thanks for the support! And onward.**

**Enjoy.**

**Midori Fujiwara

* * *

**

Tsunade wasn't surprised when she was stirred awake to hear the early morning reports. Actually, she had attempted to stay up until she heard about Anko's leave. But Anko was much more of a night person than Tsunade, and Tsunade fell asleep waiting impatiently.

But the news of Kakashi doing the exact same thing startled her. Unlike Anko, Kakashi was more law-abiding, and actually still had students in Konoha. So she was almost completely thrown off by the news of the _two _jounin leaving on the same night.

"So what do we do?" the ANBU unit asked her slowly.

Tsunade leaned back against her chair. "Retrieve them, of course."

The ANBU was halfway at the door when Tsunade added another comment.

"But if persuasion doesn't work, and Orochimaru is close enough…help them."

Hell, those two jounin were not the only people who wanted to get back at Orochimaru.

-XIII-

Anko was not a morning person.

But she was one hell of light sleeper.

"Hatake!" she stormed when he attempted to leave her. Well, she had mentioned that she didn't want any interference…

"Good morning," he replied, giving her a cheesy smile.

Anko quickly got herself ready for travel, scolding him the whole time. "Idiot, thinking you could get away with getting away from me! Weren't you the one who had decided we were taking the same route? And what about your little 'teamwork rules' motto?"

He didn't flinch and let out a quiet sigh. Kakashi still didn't believe the coincidence. Knowing Anko for some several years, he knew she could have just been following him and made up an excuse at the moment. She was just that kind of a person.

But he reminded himself that she was the one ahead, and that he had attacked her first, mistaking her for an ANBU that he had planned to tie up and bribe to keep quiet.

It wasn't a bad idea to have Anko along with him because of her former relationship with Orochimaru, but it was almost as bad as dragging Naruto out with him.

Except that Anko was more violent, had a different purpose, and had rarely ever gone on missions with him, not including the times they had worked together in the ANBU.

He noticed Anko in her peripheral vision, stepping behind in order to collect a few leaves off some random plant.

He couldn't complain though, since teaming up with Anko would definitely prove to be an advantage.

-XIII-

His raspy voice made Kabuto worry.

"How much longer will this treatment take? It is disabling my powers," Orochimaru demanded.

"It's much longer since you've already put it off for more than a half year. If you had taken it the day I recommended it, you wouldn't have deteriorated so much and the medicines wouldn't be taking so long…not to mention all the ingredients had to multiplied in quantity…the items are already difficult to obtain—"

"You talk too much and don't do enough research," Orochimaru's soft slow voice scolded. Despite carrying no anger, his authority created that tone for him. "By now, continuous research should have found a quicker alternative."

"Sorry Lord Orochimaru, but I don't have a large number of test subjects close to you—"

"How much longer is the treatment?" Orochimaru repeated.

Kabuto actually didn't know. Orochimaru's health was taking an extremely bad toll. He was already an elderly in a younger body that was rejecting him. Disease would exacerbate his age procession.

"It will be over before your time comes to be reborn."

Orochimaru's mood lightened at the very mention of a rebirth. Not only would he continue to live on to eventually complete his lifelong goal, but he had an Uchiha _willing _to be replaced by him. The Sharingan and youth would become his own _so _soon.

"Is that guaranteed?" Orochimaru asked. "Remember, Kabuto, you are dealing with my life or death."

"Yes," Kabuto ensured. He brightened. How good it felt to be actually responsible for something important…and to be _trusted _with what he did as well. It was life or death many other times as well. Such a _privilege _to hold a Legendary Sannin's life!

How _appreciated _Kabuto felt.

And not only that, but with Orochimaru depending so much on him, even though in reality Orochimaru was all the more powerful, Kabuto had the legend wrapped around his little finger.

-XIII-

Kurenai stood outside Anko's door, hearing her shadow clone do all sorts of crazy things inside her apartment. All the normal things Anko would do.

But Kurenai wasn't tricked and she had already heard the report about the two, now rogue, ninja. It was stupid, really, Kurenai thought, to leave a clone when she would just make her escape obvious anyway.

Kurenai had no idea how to feel. She was extremely ambiguous. While she understood Anko's need to go head against Orochimaru, she felt as though Anko was really just throwing her life away.

Kurenai's mind felt like a blank slate, but she knew unconsciously that she was only repeating the same question over again and again.

She decided on her solution, despite the other half of her objecting, and knocked on Anko's door.

Anko came out with a big smile on her face, which almost made Kurenai fall into tears because Kurenai knew she would never see that smile again.

Kurenai informed the clone quickly. "They've already caught you and set off to track you down just a few moments ago. There are three groups of four ANBU units each. They're using the Branched Tree Formation and plan to narrow down on you in a triangle. It's best to not travel in a straight line…you might be caught."

The clone looked quizzedly at her, donut half eaten and her left cheek stuffed, crumbs along her lips. "I don't understand."

"It's the last help I can offer you…as a friend, even though I would rather have you stay here in Konoha," Kurenai replied, slipping out a kunai from behind her back and killing Anko's shadow clone.

It disappeared in a defeated cloud of smoke.

Kurenai, emotionally wrecked, fell to the floor on her knees. Tears formed over her eyes because she knew all too well that she had just killed her friend by helping her get herself killed by Orochimaru, and was crying in advance so that the funeral wouldn't be so overwhelming.

-XIII-

"252," Kakashi stated simply.

Anko's eyebrows furrowed, but then they loosened, because she realized what she was referring to. "Hn," she replied. "Still remember the ANBU codes, Kakashi?"

"What else can you memorize when you're drilled all day?"

Anko thought a moment. "I'm not going to waste energy on a 252," she answered. "Besides—"

A sudden mental thought clamored with her own. Anko tripped on the protruding bark of a tree, and went headfirst into a descent.

"Shit," Anko muttered, focusing her chakra to her feet, allowing her to flip back onto the next branch, avoiding a fatal blow. She breathed heavily, wondering what was going on.

Kakashi had stopped a few trees up farther. He turned around, waiting and mocked, "Tired?"

Anko ignored him and proceeded in their travel, passing Kakashi until he caught back up with her again.

"Kurenai killed my clone," she explained. "She told me the ANBU were already dispatched and that they were using Branched Tree Formation…" Anko trailed off when she realized that Kakashi's suggestion for a 252 was the best counter against capture.

"252," Kakashi repeated to prove his point.

"But how can you be so sure that they've assumed we're traveling together?"

"We left at the same time and place," he simply said. He didn't add that it was also obvious because Tsunade knew Anko was the type to join up into groups rather than go alone.

Anko seemed to want to object but didn't want to argue, and lose another debate against Kakashi. That was what she found annoying about Kakashi—he wasn't the type to explain his plans and simply bossed people around. That and the fact that he was practically always right.

The type that made a better enemy then an ally.

"Fine then," Anko said. "252…I'll take Formation B."

"I'll do the opposite," he replied.

Then after the next branch, they both followed their own counter plan roles.

-XIII-

Since Sakura had awoken earlier than Naruto, she had heard about the news before him.

She landed perfectly on Naruto's balcony and rapped quickly on the glass screen, waiting for some movement. She figured using her voice would get him up even quicker.

"Naruto!" she called angrily. Geez, for such a determined shinobi, Sakura would have expected him to wake up early and train, like Lee. Her message wasn't exactly an emergency, but it was one of those things that someone would want to know about right away.

Knowing Naruto, he'd probably leap into action instantly.

The first she saw of him was his tongue when his mouth stretched wide to yawn. She grimaced, almost feeling the hot foul breath coming out of his mouth even through the glass.

"Morning, Sakura-chan," Naruto said. He noticed that her eyebrows were knitted together—so he didn't think it was to ask him on a private date or to tell him she had ramen cooking at her house was inviting him.

"What, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked, swinging open the screen door. "What do you need so early in the morning?"

"Kakashi-sensei left Konoha without a word," Sakura informed him.

"But we just saw him yesterday—"

"Yes! And he left that night!"

Naruto's drowsy eyes were gone. "Why? On a mission? What?"

"Not on a mission. He _left, _Naruto," Sakura corrected. "He is now a missing-nin."

"But….what?" Naruto exclaimed in disbelief. "Doesn't that mean…that he's considered enemy to Konoha now?"

Sakura's eyebrows raised and her lips shaped into a small circle. She hadn't realized that before Naruto had mentioned it. "Y-yeah."

"Well…where the hell did he go? And what did he go for?"

Sakura was still confused as well. "I don't know. Don't ask me!"

She retraced what had happened yesterday…Kakashi _had _told Naruto he was being aggressive…he _had _mentioned Sasuke… and she _had _asked if another mission was coming up…

"I think," Sakura concluded. "That he went to go find Sasuke."

Naruto's eyes froze. He looked down, eyes closed. Then he looked back up at Sakura again.

"Well…then what are we doing here?"

-XIII-

"Do you understand your new mission? Remember your previous ones still apply. No mission I have given you has to be completed at any specific time, and in no specific order. If you find completion of one faster than the other at a certain situation, do it. Do you understand?"

Sai nodded.

"In the meantime, you will rally progress information to me on a daily basis. Clear?"

"Crystal."

Danzo settled back into his seat, eyes closed, thinking. A genius really, Danzo was the ultimate planner and thinker. His mind power alone got him permission to create his own group within the ANBU completely independent of the Hokage.

Danzo was practically Hokage to the Foundation. No other person had authority over the Foundation members than him. Not even the Hokage had say in his operations.

"Open your mouth," he demanded.

Sai obediently did so without question.

Danzo nodded his head. "I thought I had sealed you already. I was only checking in case I had skipped you."

Sai looked down, pressing his lips together.

"Those of the Foundation carry no emotion or feeling, no past or present. There is only the mission…and you are only a tool," Danzo reminded him.

Sai continued to stare at the floor.

"Dismissed," Danzo said.

Sai gave him a brief bow of the head and disappeared.

Danzo waited for a few moments.

"Unit 743012," he called.

Yet another Foundation member appeared before him.

"I will assign you a new mission. Put all your focus on this one. Withhold your current missions for this new one I will provide you," Danzo commanded.

"Hai," Unit 743012 saluted.

"Your mission is to keep an eye on the unit I was previously talking to. His given name is Sai. If he does not follow my orders, I want to you to notify me immediately. Understood?"

"Yes."

"If you are asked what you are doing you will make up an excuse depending on the situation. Whatever you do, do not inform anyone of your mission."

"Agreed."

"I trust you, Unit 743012," Danzo said. "Now your comrade Sai has to be careful. Otherwise he's going to end up like his comrade who he considers his brother."

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**:P**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	5. Chapter 5

**Enjoy.**

**Midori Fujiwara**

* * *

Anko spotted Kakashi up a few more hundred feet. Their counter had worked up to now. Neither of them had been caught yet and counter plan 252 was going to end once Anko joined Kakashi once again.

She was about to increase her speed to be able to catch up with him, ending her formation role B. But she suddenly had a fun idea. Besides, what else could she do in the time they were traveling?

Anko quickly condensed her chakra into stealth mode and rapidly gained speed, traveling on a level below Kakashi. Keeping her eyes up at him, she accelerated until she was practically gliding, and at the right moment, shot herself up and pounced on Kakashi's back.

"Boo!" she yelled, cackling.

"Oof! Shit!" Kakashi muttered, losing his pace and with Anko's force down on him, falling below a level.

He almost splat against the following branch, but put his arms above him and released shuriken up and around a tree branch overhead. This weaved a string around the upper branch, allowing him to swing up onto another branch, rather than get injured flat on the tree.

He released the string, and the shuriken fell back into his hand, which he tucked back into his supply pocket. Kakashi wasn't planning to waste weapons at this early point.

"Idiot!" he said, after Anko kicked off his back and landed gracefully in front of him. "You don't injure a team member!"

She was even _worse _than Naruto.

"But I scared you, didn't I?" Anko defended.

"Well, I thought you were smart enough to know that I would have sensed you around me once I was in your visual field. Hence you wouldn't have even _tried _to scare me," he explained, anger curling at his restrained voice.

"A shinobi like you should have realized that I was coming up under you anyway!" Anko scoffed. When she didn't receive Kakashi's forgiveness, she sighed, "God, you're still as serious as you always used to be. Can't you take a joke?"

She said this and suddenly Kakashi lost his rigid composure. She wouldn't have normally noticed, but his mind seemed to suddenly change. He stared at her, disbelieving her stupidity, but his eyes appeared distant.

"Just don't do that again," he said softly. Even his voice lost the severity it had a few moments ago. "Let's go."

-XIII-

Tsunade sensed a mass of people coming down the hall. Her subconscious awakened her from sleep and she quickly fixed herself to make it seem as though she had been working the whole time.

The last thing she had done was dispatch 12 ANBU units to go after Kakashi and Anko. Then after thinking and pondering a long while, she knocked out and fell asleep.

Now what?

But she was surprised to see Danzou with his men enter her office.

"Lady Tsunade," Danzou saluted. But he didn't wait for her to acknowledge him. "You are being displaced as Hokage."

Tsunade stood up. "Repeat that so that I'm sure I heard the right thing," she snarled. Despite her challenging confrontational countenance, in truth she was extremely terrified of what would happen if such a shady character like him replaced her.

It wasn't that she was implying she was a better Hokage, but she suspected Danzou was not the best candidate.

"If anything, Hatake should sit here before you even touch it."

"Hatake was student of a student who had trained under the Sannin that had learned from the Third Hokage. His mistakes cannot be repeated," Danzou said.

Tsunade knew this implied an argument against her taking place on the Hokage chair as well.

"Additionally, Kakashi Hatake is now a missing ninja."

Tsunade grit her teeth. "He left in order to retrieve Sasuke Uchiha."

Danzou ignored her defense of the new missing-nin. "You trust those who cannot be trusted."

"At least I'm right in not trusting you," she spat back.

Danzou took the offense lightly. "I have been with Konoha all my life. I have considerable power over the Foundation, the root of the ANBU force. The ANBU force has protected Konoha since after the Uchiha Military Force. I think I have a little more base to be trusted on than you, Tsunade-sama." But he said her name title sarcastically, not intending any respect at all.

"In fact, you, even as Hokage, hadn't managed in any way to capture Orochimaru. Orochimaru, as your former teammate, may have some relation—"

"Shut up," Tsunade interrupted. "Don't assume things about me because I can just as easily accuse you of assigning a mission to assassinate Sasuke Uchiha, along with many other dedicated ninja of Konoha."

She continued, "I have no idea about any of your intentions, but at least the decisions I made are reported—"

"Your success is your fall," he retorted. "Your given mission was for these 12 ANBU to _retrieve _Kakashi Hatake and Anko Mitarashi. By shinobi law, these two ninja are now enemy. You did the same for Sasuke Uchiha. Do you operate more by opinion or by rule?"

"Yamato is not a missing-nin," Tsunade simply replied, reminding Danzou that Yamato was on Sai's hit list.

"Yamato is a survivor of Orochimaru's experiment. He must be wiped out."

"I don't understand how you will go about wiping out every trace of Orochimaru," Tsunade objected. "He has tampered with everyone's life."

"Not the naïve new generation. I will start from scratch and purge Konoha of its bad beginnings."

"You're stating your opinion that Konoha's previous Hokage and founder was completely wrong. Restate your loyalty?" Tsunade asked, since Danzou's speech seemed so inconsistent.

"But you'll be the one dismissed and locked-up for not following Konoha rules. First, you have supported retrieval of three enemies. Second, you don't have that Wlll of Fire to sacrifice yourself in killing Orochimaru. Third, you have just resisted change in Hokage. Rule states that if Hokage is wished to be dismissed by majority ninja population, the Hokage will be forced to step out."

Tsunade's anger turned into vulnerable shock.

Danzou took pleasure in seeing Tsunade's face of surprise.

"Where is this majority?" Tsunade demanded, regaining her composure.

Danzou smiled lightly. "I can't believe you have forgotten that ANBU troops make up a large amount of the ninja Konoha has, especially now that a few have left…and two and twelve make fourteen. You lost a substantial number, which turns rule over to me."

* * *

**Oh crap...what will happen now? Love the comments and reviews!**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	6. Chapter 6

**Thank you for all the support! Sorry the story is turning out slowww...**

**Enjoy.**

**Midori Fujiwara

* * *

**

The ox-masked ANBU unit of group A in the Operation: locate Hatake and Mitarashi was the commander of his group, and was the one to receive the radio message from the Hokage.

The ox ANBU stopped, brows furrowing in surprise.

The other tree ANBU of his group stopped as well.

"What's up?" asked the tiger mask.

"Hold on," said the Ox, listening closely to make sure he hadn't heard wrong. "We…our Hokage…Lady Tsunade has been replaced by Danzou."

"Danzou of the Root?" exclaimed the lion, in what sounded like disbelief.

"Shut up, he's making a new assignment," said the ox. After a few moments, Ox said, "Our subjects are still the same, however, rather than just locating and retrieving them, or helping them depending on how close to the Sound country they are, we are now locating them and assassinating them."

"…M-Mitarashi and Hatake?" the eagle exclaimed. "No…no way…"

Ox was concerned as well. "Repeat mission," he said into his microphone. He listened again and nodded to confirm the new objectives.

The four ANBU looked at each other, dumbfounded, and not as willing to do the mission, knowing the two shinobi were once ANBU members themselves. Comrades of them.

"They're classified as missing-nin and must be killed. Period," Ox repeated.

"Not even a chance," Lion whistled in pity. "But I don't see how those two shinobi are actually going to be threats."

"Danzou accuses Hatake of a stolen Sharingan and Anko of a cursed mark relation with Orochimaru," Ox continued.

"This is just stupid and insane. Overdoing things…" the eagle said, disapproving.

The tiger stood silent before saying, "We'll do as we're told. Otherwise _we _are threats to Konoha ourselves." He looked at his comrades to plead them to be flexible. "If we really do find them…we'll figure something out. But for now, let's go search for them."

"I don't believe Danzou's obsession with making Konoha pure and all. He's just mad that the Third had beat him to Hokage," the eagle said.

"He wants to create a military nation and be strong rather than passive and weak," the lion replied. "He has good intentions for the village."

"There's a loss of two great shinobi if we carry out our operation. I don't see how that is good for us," the eagle objected. "He's going to keep eliminating until he has only himself."

The Ox ended the discussion by stating, "Listen, the last thing you want is to be called a threat just because you questioned the Sixth's rule. We will resume."

-XIII-

Kakashi could feel his chakra reserve running low. Looking at the position of the sun, he figured out that it was pretty late into the afternoon already and almost passing into the evening. Safe travel could still be taken, but Kakashi doubted he would last into the late night, especially knowing that he did not have a large supply of chakra or stamina.

He also started to notice that he was falling slightly behind Anko.

Anko took a quick glance at Kakashi. She slowed her pace a bit for him.

"Tired?" Kakashi asked.

Anko's eyes narrowed. "No, but I know you are," she explained. "Do you want to call it a day?"

Kakashi mentally calculated the remaining distance. If they travelled only in the daylight, they still had about one and a half full days of movement to go.

The ANBU were dispatched the morning after Kakashi and Anko had left.

"We can spare a few hours of rest," he said.

Anko thought a bit. "Sure," she agreed.

They picked a location and scanned their surrounding before sitting down against a large tree.

"How much time are we allowing ourselves?" Anko asked.

"Five or six hours," Kakashi suggested.

"Oh, I was willing to take even only three," Anko said.

"Why? In a rush?" Kakashi asked. "You need the rest before facing anyone of that caliber."

Anko said nothing. She was going to fail, no matter how hard she would try in any case. She faced her head up to the sky, leaning her head against the tree trunk and closed her eyes before opening them again a few moments afterward.

She took in all the peace and beauty of the landscape. Being out here in the open and not knowing anything, could make her become oblivious. But she wouldn't let herself forget.

She recalled the pain that Orochimaru left her in, inside the dark locked shack. She had cried and begged for her teacher, but he never came back until she was knocked out the next morning, practically drowning and choking in her own tears.

He shook her and she woke up, surprised that she was still alive when she was so sure she had died that night. Her sensei smiled. He had said that he had always known Anko would have made it through alive. He talked about her body…in a way that reminded her of one of his previous experiments. Her body had accepted the enzymes, or rather, the enzymes had accepted her. And her sensei just smiled and smiled, a different kind of light in his eyes that she had never noticed before, and at that point, she felt as though he was actually happy about the torture he had forced her through.

Anko recalled the pain, and her back curved in, her hands clenched against the dirt, and her toes curled in. It was only a second of imagined agony, and compared nothing to what she had suffered that night. Yet it was still unbearable.

Anko asked herself many times over and over how she had even survived that. She asked herself everyday if she was truly alive.

She truly felt how Uchiha Sasuke had felt when he was first marked by Orochimaru. She relived the pain, watching the boy fight against enzymes that weren't his own.

Where did Orochimaru get these enzymes from? To what extent was his genius? Why did he use his genius in a completely unethical way?

Anko forced herself to stop thinking. She had to get her mind off, otherwise she wouldn't be mentally able enough to actually defeat Orochimaru—or at least mark a mark on him—when the time came. She turned her head to Kakashi's direction, hoping that he'd be able to make a conversation with her about something else so she'd forget for that small time.

"So, Kakashi, anything interesting news that—"

And then Kakashi disappeared into a cloud of smoke, leaving nothing behind.

At least _that _took her mind off Orochimaru.

"What? Kakashi?" Anko exclaimed, checking to see if it was just her imagination. But it wasn't! Alas, Kakashi had truly disappeared and she was out here all alone! All this time? "Kakashi?" she called.

She hadn't been hallucinating all this time had she? She wasn't going _that _insane, was—

"Oh hey Anko," his voice came out of nowhere.

Her eyes shot daggers at him as Kakashi stepped out of the brush, a small towel in his hand, drying his hair off.

"The water over there is great after a long day," he said, as if nothing had happened.

"You fucking scared the shit out of me," Anko hissed. "I thought that I had been only imagining you all this time." She glared at his cheesy smile, the one eyed smile. "This is to get back at me from this morning right?"

"No," Kakashi defended, shaking his hands in front of himself. "I had to put a clone in my place just to make sure it really was you," he excused himself.

Anko was still angry. "And you get the chance to rinse off too," she grumbled, noticing his wet hair as well.

"Well…you were just sitting there," he said.

"Just shut up," Anko said, looking to the side, still angry. She was slightly mad at herself for not even noticing. Kakashi was right. She couldn't just go around without watching out carefully. What if Orochimaru had disguised himself as Kakashi? She couldn't put her guard just because there was another jounin with her.

Having a companion was actually, at times, more dangerous than being alone, because when trust was given to that companion, who could be easily replaced, harm was being invited.

"Well…" Kakashi began. God, women were so _sensitive. _"I would have said something, but you know how that would just blow my cover."

"No, I'm not mad at you," Anko snapped. "I'm just…being too careless. If…I mean, I didn't even notice …if that had been someone else, I would have just killed everything."

Kakashi processed her words. He nodded, understanding. He joined her by the tree.

"Well then, want to make up some way to verify each other?" Kakashi asked. "Like some code or something?"

"Now you're just making me feel like a kid," Anko said. "Now you're starting to make me mad," she added dryly.

His one eye she could see had that mocking glint she didn't particularly like. She rolled her eyes and stood up, putting her hands in her pocket.

"I'm going to rinse myself, too," she announced, and then kicked dirt back at Kakashi as she stepped away—twice for good measure.

-XIII-

Naruto and Sakura quietly met up at the corner of the ramen shop. Seeing each other, they nodded and disappeared from the area.

They _had _to talk to Lady Tsunade. Kakashi-sensei was definitely not a missing nor runaway nin that betrayed Konoha. It was just all a misunderstanding! Kakashi was just going to retrieve Sasuke!

Once arriving at the Hokage's office building, Sakura and Naruto exchanged a few words.

"You're the one talking, right?" Sakura asked.

"Yeah…what do you think?" Naruto said.

Sakura halted a moment. And actually she had a pretty bad gut feeling about how things looked like they were going to turn out. Sakura and him were both close to two announce missing-nin. Wasn't it natural for the village to suspect them two next as traitors? Wouldn't they be _expecting_ Naruto and Sakura to go out and complain or try to talk things over?

Sakura grit her teeth, not quite sure what to make of her intuition. Lady Tsunade trusted both her and Naruto. Would it be better to just drop the subject, or talk to the Lady and risk more ambiguity?

"Wait, Naruto," Sakura said, holding Naruto back by the shoulder.

Naruto turned around, eyes questioning her. But he didn't object, waiting to hear what she had to say.

"_We _might be suspected of treason if we go up to protest. We've already tried once for Sasuke. This is going to be a second time. It's not going to seem like a coincidence anymore," Sakura explained.

"Granny Tsunade trusts us though," Naruto said softly, repeating exactly what Sakura was thinking. "I'm pretty sure that she'll understand."

Sakura's eyebrows furrowed. "Yeah…that's the thing. I don't think she'd consider Kakashi a missing-nin either…there's probably something else…some other reason why Kakashi would be announced as a missing-nin."

Naruto realized Sakura's side of the argument and looked as though he had just gotten more frustrated. "Maybe she's just required to announce that Kakashi-sensei is missing."

"But for a long time she hadn't called Sasuke missing until the time started approaching, after we attempted to retrieve him and failed," Sakura argued. "Besides, Kakashi has been absent more than once, and whether he's with us legally or illegally, we're reassigned to Commander Yamato and notified immediately. Today, there was nothing. I only heard the news from Shizune."

"Sounds fishy," Naruto agreed. "That's why we have to investigate." He pulled away from Sakura's grasp and began to make up the stairs.

"No, that's the point," Sakura objected, blocking him from going any further. "We have to investigate…but from far away. We'll see what's going on, then make our move."

Naruto shrugged. "Sure Sakura-chan…whatever."

Sakura's eyebrow twitched in irritation. Naruto wasn't taking her seriously.

"Come on, Naruto," she said, holding back a torrent of yells. She scanned the surroundings, then after ensuring the coast was clear, started to walk up the wall of the Hokage's office building.

"Hey, what are you doing, Sakura?" Naruto called.

Sakura threw a warning kunai down at Naruto. "Baka!" she hissed. "Shut up and follow me!" She waited for Naruto to catch up, but he stayed underneath her.

Her foot went down to kick him.

"_Beside _me!" Sakura specified, not liking the idea of Naruto taking the opportunity to look up her dress. How immature.

"What?" Naruto asked. "What are you getting all worked up about? I'm just _following _you like you said!" His angry eyes shot lasers up at her.

Sakura's emerald eyes softened. Naruto was so naïve too…she was just overthinking things—

"It's not like I was looking up your skirt or anything," Naruto added afterward, with a smirk.

Sakura's rage clicked once she realized that she hadn't been just overreacting.

He really _was _perverted.

Sakura's foot kicked Naruto square in the shoulder this time. "You train under all the perverts."

The two were about to go down into a fight but were reminded to keep quiet once they heard a low male voice that seemed slightly too familiar. They exchanged glances, searching on each other's faces for any hints to who the speaker was.

Danzou.

Naruto's eyes furrowed and he climbed ahead of Sakura, eventually balancing on the ledge next to the grandiose window extending from the Hokage's office. The first thing he noticed was that Lady Tsunade was no longer sitting in her chair. As he pulled Sakura up the same level, he mouthed the information.

"Danzou is Hokage!" he exclaimed.

Sakura shook her head as if she didn't believe what she was seeing, and looked again to confirm Naruto's words. "But how?" she mouthed back to Naruto.

Naruto shrugged.

Sakura started to climb back down the building. "Danzou is Sai's superior. We have to find some way to get him to tell us a little more about Danzou as Hokage, even with that seal on his tongue."

But despite running all over the village and checking Sai's apartment more than once, the two could not find Sai at all that night.

-XIII-

One hour or two into their break, Anko had gotten increasingly restless. She knew very well that she shouldn't have been impatient, but she was just that kind of person. Her hair hadn't even dried from her rinse yet, and she was already ready to start travelling again.

She strongly doubted Kakashi was the same way. She had learned while working with him before that he tired easily, never having a lot of chakra in reserve and being even further burdened with the Sharingan, even when covered up behind his forehead protector.

Kakashi looked bored himself, but Anko knew that was just his external appearance. In reality, he was taking every second of rest he could.

"Hey Hatake," Anko called.

He acknowledged her.

"I'm sorry about before," she said, "when I jumped on you." She knew very well that she had touched on something about the past when she mentioned how serious he still was, and felt bad saying that before thinking and considering carefully about the impact of her words.

Kakashi gave no response and turned his head off to the side. He looked like he was about to say something, but if he did, he didn't mention anything more.

"Whatever happened to your brother?" Kakashi asked a long time later.

Anko bit her lip. She didn't answer right away and Kakashi asked bluntly, "Is that part of the reason why Orochimaru is on your hitlist?"

Anko shifted her line of vision over to the trees on the left of her so Kakashi wouldn't read facts off her face that she didn't want to mention and be asked about.

"No," she said stiffly. "Orochimaru is a problem all on his own."

Kakashi got the idea that he shouldn't probe in too much more into Anko's personal world.

"I loved my brother very much," she said.

The use of past tense implied more information to Kakashi tan the facts being given to him by meaning.

"I used to think of him as so annoying," she continued. "Then I became a hypocrite and took on all his characteristics and personality." She turned her face back to Kakashi. "I used to hate sweets," she said, smiling with a faint hint of sadness.

"That's hard to believe," Kakashi responded. But it was very easy to understand. Kakashi had gone through practically the same type of character transition—taking on the traits of someone else…

"Come to think of it," Anko said, "I'll go find a snack to eat." She kept her countenance bright, but it was easy to tell she was only trying to change the subject. She stood promptly and opened her pack. Quickly rummaging through it, Anko eventually found the food package she wanted and pulled it out.

A small box popped out of her bag as well, but before Kakashi could even catch it with his eyes, Anko had tucked it securely back in her pack already.

Closing her bag, which implied she was going to eat all the mooncake she had pulled out. Anko held out the package toward Kakashi in an offer.

Kakashi wasn't particularly fond of sweets and desserts but mooncake wasn't too sweet and he recognized that a chance to eat might not come by after this break so he reached for three whole mooncakes.

"Red bean," he said after biting into one and looking at the filling.

She nodded, recognizing the meaning of her name. But something seemed off for a moment.

Kakashi was eating?

She turned her head to take a glimpse at his face.

Immediately, she spat her food out to the side in shock.

"What?" Kakashi asked when Anko looked back up at him.

Anko couldn't say anything however because he had already eaten all the food he had taken and replaced his mask over his lower face, hiding it once more.

"Nothing," she said, slightly disturbed. She knew she should have felt privileged to see the great enigma of Konoha, but afterwards actually seeing his face, Anko felt much more awkward than, if anything, charmed.

She focused all her attention on the next bite of food and thought hard, concentrating on the texture and flavor of the mooncake rolling on her tongue. Mooncake, a delicacy traditionally eaten only a year in Asian culture.

She kept herself from vomiting when she suddenly reminded herself of the more profound significance of the mooncake in her culture.

Mooncakes were eaten under the full moon and shared by _lovers_.

In attempting to keep more food from exiting her mouth, she got some bits into her throat. She choked on those crumbs for a long while.

"Anko, are you okay?" Kakashi asked. First she spat out food…then a few moments later, she coughed on chewed food.

Was she just overreacting over getting a glimpse of face or something?

-XIII-

Kakashi simply didn't understand all the hype about his face. Sure, he never really revealed it in public, but why would that concern anyone anyways? So what? His face was his face. Anyone trying to look at it was probably searching for a way to make fun of him in some way.

And even if a person did see his face, it was just his face. He wasn't a different color or had some sort of deformation. He had a nose, mouth, and jaw just like everyone else.

No need for the world to end if his face was spotted.

He waited for her choking to die out before tossing her a canteen of water that he had filled before rinsing off at the water source.

She caught it, thanked him without a word, and poured water into her mouth, clearing her throat before returning it to him.

"Are you okay?" he asked again, but in more of statement than a question.

"Yeah…I just ate too fast," she replied.

Awkward silence followed and to try to make the situation less weird, Anko closed her eyes and pretended to take a nap.

-XIII-

She had never intended to actually fall asleep and by the time Kakashi had awoken her, it was already late into the evening, soon to turn to pure night.

"Heh, so you decided to wait for me this time," Anko said, referring to Kakashi's failed attempt the previous time.

"You're a light sleeper," he said. "There'd be no escape."

"Escape?" Anko questioned. "You make me sound like a prison."

"Well, I _am _stuck with you," Kakashi agreed. "Come to think of it, weren't you originally going to be the prison ward chief?"

"Why? Are you going to be recommending me to Hokage-sama for a better position?" Anko asked. "Then I should be nicer to you…but then again I like being proctor…the genin are so easy to scare off."

"You scare everyone off," Kakashi muttered, picking up his book from the last words he stopped at.

"Did you say something?" Anko threatened, slipping behind him, pressing a kunai against his throat.

Kakashi turned his head to her. "What did I say about not attacking your comrades?"

Anko replaced the blade into her sleeve. She took a quick glance at the crescent moon. "Hn," she replied. "Come on then, the next few nights are going to turn brighter so we'll move faster to stay undercover. Besides, ANBU are on our tracks now…so des'ka?"

Kakashi closed his book with one hand and tucked it into his back pocket, sighing. "So des'," he agreed. "Let's go."

-XIII-

Sakura hitched her pack to a more comfortable position on her back. She wanted to pack lightly, but neither Naruto nor her knew the way to Sound Country well, and they weren't expecting everyone to be extremely friendly.

Naruto landed on the ground beside her.

"Ready?" he asked.

Sakura nodded and then they both set out, confident enough to take the risk. It wouldn't matter if they were declared missing-nin; that only meant there was a suspicion they were betraying the village.

They had decided that they would retrieve Sasuke for Konoha—and even if Konoha thought they were the bad guys, it would be proven wrong when they returned with all they had planned and expected.

Well..that was their own mission.

And they had swore on their lives that they would accomplish it.

Yet, their journey had only lasted for one step before the two of them were stopped.

-XIII-

They both turned around and were shocked to see Sai behind them.

"Stop," Sai simply said.

None of the three made a movement, indicating none of them were willing to give in to the other.

Sakura was first to talk, trying to make a truce. "Why don't you come with us, Sai? You're part of our family now, we have to stand for each other."

Sai looked down.

"I don't recommend leaving Konoha," Sai repeated. He quickly became frustrated as he failed again and again at trying to find the right words to say.

Naruto stepped up to Sai. "Weren't you the one who wanted to see the bonds? How strong they were? How important they make life? Why now? Why do you stop us now?" he asked angrily. "Haven't you learned yet how much we're willing to sacrifice for a traitorous cockroach like Sasuke Uchiha?"

"I know your bonds are strong," Sai said. "But I…want to stop you from leaving Konoha."

"We might die on the way but we had already expected death to come anyway," Naruto answered. "What more can happen?"

Sai stared at Naruto, unable to speak the thoughts that ran through his head.

"But if you aren't close to us as we think you are…it doesn't matter, you can stay in Konoha. We're going to retrieve Sasuke! And that's that!"

"I had a mission," Sai finally said.

Naruto and Sakura suddenly froze.

"I…it was expected you two would leave. I was assigned to leave Konoha with you. But I would remain as a spy. Eventually, my peers would hunt you down and assassinate you," Sai said. "So…I'm telling you not to leave Konoha."

Sakura and Naruto reconsidered Sai's position.

"Come to think of it," Sakura said. "Your commander is now Hokage. How did that happen? Where is Lady Tsunade? What _happened _to her?"

Sai's emotionless face kept blank. He didn't utter a word. "I can't discuss anything about my superior about you. Do you remember the seal on my tongue?"

Sakura nodded, but Naruto was quieted for only a few moments.

"I don't even know if I can trust you…anymore," Naruto honestly admitted. "No offense, Sai, but there's just so many things we don't know about you, and the fact that you can't even express yourself well and don't have…emotions…that's kind of what makes up a human."

"I'm not a human," Sai agreed. "Those of the Foundation are the core of our village. We are the mere tools that build our society, tools with no past or future. We do what we are told and ensure completion. We lack feeling and emotion because the ultimate sacrifice anyone can make to his or her village is his or her humanity.

"Even I do not know who I am myself. My codename is Sai, but I do not know any other identity for me. But, joining Team Kakashi…that has been an opening to another gateway in my life. Never have I felt more…distinct and alive. It is difficult to learn how to become a human after being trained and drilled to be a simple tool. But I'm willing to take the challenge and regain what I had lost in my childhood. I will become someone…and that's why I am denying the success of my superior's goals. This is why I warn you not to leave Konoha. That way there will be no need for me to carry out the orders given to me. I believe I can become human again, and I know that the first step to doing that is making my own decisions and creating my own future."

Naruto and Sakura had never heard Sai give a lecture as long as the one he had given at the moment. The two of them were touched by Sai's story—despite having no real emotions—and processed his words deeply.

Naruto was first to respond.

"Sorry, Sai," Naruto apologized. "You can't…stop us from going…"

Sai's head went down when he realized his carefully chosen words had gone to waste and failed to persuade either one of his comrades to stay.

"You're just coming with us," Naruto smirked.

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**:D Review please? Really gets me going through the nights!**

**Thank you in advance!**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	7. Chapter 7

**Hm...you know what I usually say...thanks to my readers, especially the reviewers, who were just more awesome, so that I know what's going on through my readers' heads.**

**Enjoy.**

**Midori Fujiwara

* * *

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Unit 743012 saluted the Hokage as he entered the office room. Danzou awaited his update for the morning.

"Sir…Sai has left the mission with the targeted ninja."

Danzou nodded, almost approvingly.

"However he has informed them the nature of his mission. I also suspect he plans to disobey your orders depending on what he considers to be right."

Danzou considered a moment, and then nodded again. "I had expected just that…but Sai is a very good actor."

-XIII-

The ox-masked ANBU stopped again in the middle of travel. His three coordinates looked exasperated at the second time they were forced to stop…and most likely to take new orders, and additional orders on that.

"The original 12 will now be split into two. That means two ANBU will be joining us. We…are going to change our direction us. We…are going to change our direction. Our new targets are coming in from the southwest. The other six will continue to track the two jounin," Ox said in verbatim of what he heard on his microphone.

"How stupid," the eagle said. "This is all completely pointless. Now we stop to go back and hunt down another few shinobi who have decided to become missing-nin as well."

"One of them is from the Root," the Ox clarified. "But he isn't expected to help in assassination."

"Who exactly are we killing?" the lion asked. "Not Sharingan Ninja nor Orochimaru's Subject any longer, which was just wrong in any case…"

"Haruna Sakura. Uzumaki Naruto, and Foundation Unit codename Sai."

The ANBU exchanged glaces.

"You think he's gone too far?" the tiger mask asked.

Even the Ox hesitated.

"We do as we are ordered," the Ox finally said.

-XIII-

Naruto, Sakura, and Sai were taking their first break after traveling all night. It would only be a momentary rest—the three didn't feel comfortable in the wide open fields of the area they had stopped in at the moment.

Sakura passed around nutrition pills and attempted to offer one of her own energy ball creations, but Sai had warned Naruto beforehand about the unpleasant taste of Sakura's creations.

Sakura was pissed, but she knew for herself that her energy balls weren't exactly appetizing. Yet, she knew the energy pellets would eventually be used later when normal food was out. That wouldn't be a bad thing—as Sakura claimed, despite the horrible taste, it was packed with nutrients and protein.

Sai suddenly looked up from eating. His eyes looked like he wanted to say something, but his mouth didn't open just yet, as if it took him a while to think about how to talk.

Sakura noticed how at that point, Sai was beginning to express more emotion. He had certainly changed from the first time they had met him. Once his eyes told nothing, but at times, they expressed Sai's thoughts, telling the world that he indeed did have an opinion about what was going on around him.

"Did you want to say something?" Sakura asked gently.

Sai looked off to the side as if he hadn't heard Sakura at all.

"I'm hearing new orders on my wireless communicator," Sai simply said.

"For you?"

Sai shook his head. "There are some ANBU—six of them—that are going to be coming down from the direction we're going in. They will attempted to kill us."

"The ANBU are out already?" Naruto yelled in disbelief.

"They had been out here already because originally they were tracking two other jounin."

"Two…?" Naruto asked, and then thought for a moment. "I know Kakashi is one…but I didn't hear of the other…"

"It's Mitarashi," Sakura said. "Remember her from the Chuunin Exams? She was the second one that came in through the window…"

Naruto shivered. "And licked my blood….oh her….wait, Kakashi is traveling with her? So he's not alone?"

"He needs all the help he can get," Sakura figured.

"Hm…" Naruto said. "We'll have to catch up to them." He turned to Sai. "Has anything about their location been mentioned on your radio?"

"I know they're about a day ahead of us," Sakura offered. "But they're probably going for the same place as we are. We'll try to meet up with them over there."

"Right," Naruto agreed. "And avoid the ANBU coming for us."

"I can lead you through a different route Sound Country," Sai offered. "Follow me after this break."

"Oh I'm good and rested! Let's head off!" Naruto declared.

Sakura and Sai could only admire Naruto's determination through their smiles.

-XIII-

Kakashi and Anko stopped mid-morning to take their break after the all night travel. Both were well exhausted; the last rest they had taken was back last evening.

"We're about another day's worth of travel away," Anko smiled.

Kakashi nodded. "You know," he said. "You never really did tell me what you were planning to do at the Sound Village once we got there."

"I thought it was obvious to you that I wanted to murder Orochimaru," Anko said.

"And how are you planning to even land a scratch on him?"

Anko grit her teeth. "I don't know," she said. "I'm making plans as I go."

"That's unlike you," Kakashi commented.

"Orochimaru changed my whole life around," Anko stated simply.

Kakashi said nothing.

"And you?"

"I need to talk to Sasuke."

Anko gave a small sarcastic laugh. "Just _talk _to him? I don't think that's going to change his mind at all." Anko looked at Kakashi straight in the face. "Orochimaru elected Sasuke because he realized the extent of Sasuke's desire to end his older brother. Sasuke would do anything for his hate and revenge, and Orochimaru knew to take that to his advantage. He knew Sasuke would have even given his life in order to avenge." Anko paused a moment. "Your words will do nothing for what Sasuke believes he's destined to do. He's too close to achieving his dream."

"He can achieve completely on his own. He doesn't need Orochimaru."

"Right, but that's the thing: Orochimaru is the only one who supports his vengeance. Everyone else states revenge will cause more pain. Sasuke denies that and so turns to Orochimaru to train him…and not you," Anko said.

Kakashi looked at Anko in a way to question how Anko would even know how Sasuke felt.

"Orochimaru…" she continued. "Was my role model. I…wanted to be just like him. He was the father I never had. I…but I did not have enough will or desire. I had no reason to be willing to give up myself to him. I lacked a goal to become stronger. I had no enemies, no need to destroy…" Anko trailed off.

Kakashi waited for more.

"But I will prove that I have the hatred he always wanted to see. I have hatred…for him."

Kakashi sat up from leaning against the tree and lay himself across the grass, hands behind his head, looking up at the leaves of trees overhead and blue sky.

"Orochimaru must be stopped," Anko said. "Kill him and Sasuke can be retrieved. Put an end of Orochimaru's rebirth and the experiments he created can be set free. Without a limit, he will continue to ride on infinity, existing forever as someone everyone is too scared to face." Anko considered before adding, "He is actually weakest at this time when his host's body begins to reject him. But at the same time, this period is critical because if Sasuke does give up himself…Orochimaru will be unstoppable."

Kakashi kept his silence.

Anko looked back over to Kakashi. "That's why I'm going to ask you to help me to _kill _Orochimaru. I know I cannot alone so…when I fail…"

Kakashi turned his head to make eye contact with Anko. He studied her a long time before returning his focus on the sky.

"I understand," he said. "I was going to help you anyways."

Anko smiled softly. "Thanks, Hatake," she said. "I could always count on you."

"You have confidence in_ me_?" Kakashi asked, knowing very well that Orochimaru was out of his league in ninja rank.

Anko shrugged. "More than myself," she said.

-XIII-

"How much more do you think we have?" Naruto asked his two teammates following closely behind. "Do you think we'll need to move faster to catch up with…"

Naruto's words trailed off and he looked behind himself, feeling all too awkward with the extended silence he was given after asking a question.

Instead, he found two ANBU units travelling in his comrades' places.

"Shit!" Naruto muttered as the ANBU made their offense first.

A torrent of shuriken came towards Naruto and Naruto quickly replaced himself with a shadow clone who took the damage for him. However, the shuriken didn't just stop there. After slicing through his shadow clone, the shuriken all curved upward, honing in on Naruto's real body?

What? Homing shuriken? Did these shuriken ever stop?

While Naruto was a second distracted, the ANBU with a pig mask came up from behind and under him. Naruto flipped in the air to avoid shuriken, but landed right into the fist of the pig-masked ANBU.

He was knocked back and landed against a tree. The impact took the breath out of him and he had nearly no time to regain air before the same shuriken came at him once more.

He was bewildered at the projectiles and wondered what kinds of jutsus or tricks were behind the ever-following shuriken. But the shuriken, Naruto realized, might have even just been a genjutsu! An illusion to distract him!

Naruto located the position of the Pig ANBU, but he swore he had seen another one. His best guess was that this other unidentified ANBU was the one operating the unique shuriken. He hurled a few kunai at the incoming shuriken. Some projectiles were deflected, but others fell to the ground.

Naruto smirked. So the whole trick to the shuriken was revealed to him. String that was controlled by the ANBU unit who was most likely in the background somewhere. Naruto scanned his surroundings and quickly devised a plan. Jumping around a little while, Naruto studied the curves of the shuriken movements to try to pinpoint a general location of the operating enemy.

Finally his chance came. Naruto watched the shuriken come straight at him. He began to run toward the weapons, seemingly asking for suicide by the shuriken, but suddenly at one point, swiped out three kunai that he placed between his fingers, running his wind-natured chakra through the blades. This extended the kunai claws and allowed Naruto to cut the strings from the shuriken before they could reach him.

Naruto had that taken care of now, but the Pig ANBU also had to be dealt with now. The Pig crept up from behind, but Naruto was already prepared, having disguised two shadow clones as the kunai he had utilized to stop the homing shuriken.

That meant Rasengan was already created and ready to be driven through the enemy's unsuspecting body. Naruto performed his attack successfully, but he had been only deceived. The Pig had put mud in his place, which sank to the ground following Naruto's jutsu.

Naruto cursed under his breath. He couldn't sense anyone or anything. He knew the whole tracker thing was not his strong point. Naruto also knew he was the type of person who would fall for the same trap much more than once. And that was because Naruto didn't want to be bothered by extra thinking and didn't like to 'guess' what the enemy would do.

He wanted to know for sure.

Naruto whirled around to scout behind him but he found that his feet were stuck to the ground. Looking down, Naruto cursed, seeing that his feet were now glued in some kind of sticky mud.

"Heh, _now _we got you," a voice said. Two ANBU emerged from the brushes. The Pig crossed his arms and the Lion spread his arms out to reveal strings weaved between his two hands.

Naruto figured he didn't have time to observe his enemies. Putting his hands up for a jutsu, Naruto quickly made an escape plan.

"Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Naruto yelled for his signature move. Five clones appeared around him, but instead of landing on the mud, he had his clones stand on his shoulders.

"What's _that _going to do?" the Pig laughed. "Your real body is still stuck in the mud!"

Naruto snarled. "Well I'm going to keep you away from me as long as possible so you won't even notice when I'm gone!"

-XIII-

Sakura had only let her guard down for a few seconds while adjusting her gloves and found herself suddenly traveling alone. Naruto and Sai were nowhere in sight, though she could have sworn she had been following right behind the two.

Sakura quickly realized that there were—there _had _to be—attackers nearby. She could sense two chakra patterns to either side of her.

Were they trying to pin down on her

But before Sakura could think of a way to avoid being caught, torrent of kunai came flying at her.

The assault had started.

Sakura gracefully dodged the kunai while she knocked off the rest with her own blade. At least, the ANBU were from Konoha, so she wouldn't expect anything crazy or special jutsu types. She'd expect everything as it comes, having studied practically all the Konoha-originated jutus forms with Tsunade during her training.

The ANBU popped out of nowhere: a monkey and an ox-masked. It was too bad the masks the ANBU wore didn't pertain at all to their special abilities. But then again, that would give the ANBU the advantage.

Which was good as long as the ANBU were fighting for you—rather than against.

-XIII-

Sai's sword slid off the sharp blade of his opponent's. He had to admit that he had not used his sword in a while, preferring hand to hand combat, and Sai struggled to keep up with fast flicks of the opponent's sword.

Not to mention that he had to take care of another ANBU, who wasn't exactly attacking him, but was observing him and still a potential opponent.

Sai decided not to use his brush and scroll until that certain opponent decided to come out. Assuming the opponent was observing, the enemy was probably attempting to retrieve battle information about him.

An eagle and a tiger. Both fearsome creature of their own atmosphere: eagle, of the sky, and tiger, of the ground.

Sai suddenly realized that the tiger's sword strokes began to grow more powerful, faster, and shorter. Sai attempted to manipulate his sword at the same pace, but split-second delays began to add up, until Sai missed blocking a sword swipe, taking a blade to chest instead.

Sai didn't allow his injury to stop or distract him, and he noticed that the eagle ANBU had disappeared from where he was before. Sai didn't think about where the Eagle might have been; there were too many valid guesses.

That's when Sai decided it was alright to whip out his brush.

Sai stood in a fighting stance and reached behind him to pull out an empty scroll of paper.

The tiger seemed to laugh mockingly at him, obviously expecting a more dangerous weapon rather than a simple brush and paper.

Sai quickly drew several snakes in ink. After they animated themselves off the page, Sai drew himself two long-bladed swords. The Tiger, now distracted by Sai's ink creations, signaled for back-up. Sai observed his surroundings, and almost overlooked the Eagle ANBU camouflaged behind him.

Sai's swords flew out at the Eagle. It was good the swords were only ink because in reality, they would have been too heavy to control with one hand each. Meanwhile, his illustrated snakes had successfully entwined themselves around the Tiger's ankles, anchoring them down to the ground.

The Eagle stood frozen as well, snakes also having captured him. Both ANBU attempted to release themselves from the ink snakes' prison, but they failed to do so.

"You know we never actually planned to kill you," the Tiger pleaded, hoping not to die after seeing how tightly Sai gripped his weaponry. One of these swords pointed at the Tiger while the other rested at the shoulder of the Eagle, about to decapitate him.

Sai wasn't sure how to react to this plead. Based on the mission, would it be better to finish them, to leave them unconscious, or to free them and let them go? He knew he couldn't trust the ANBU's words, but he couldn't just dismiss them as well.

He also knew he wasn't used to making his own decisions. Often a mission had a straightforward answer for whatever event would take place. If A was to happen, one would do this, but if B or C were to happen, instead actions would be different. Sai tried to think logically, but he knew that one way thinking couldn't make a decision where there were numerous possibilities and results, all of them equal in value, and both having disadvantages and consequences of their own.

Sai learned that being human was much harder than he had originally thought at first. He had thought it was all about the emotions and then he would re-become a normal person. But no, emotions were among the easiest part of humanity to copy. Sai had lost much more in joining the Foundation.

And after all this pondering, he _still _had no idea what to do.

So just to settle things, Sai killed them both. Ink and blood mixed before actual bodies fell to the ground.

Sai stared at the two bodies, still and motionless.

He began to think that he might have never become a true human, no matter how hard he might try to become normal. He didn't even have a conscience, or a thought about murder. He had noticed Naruto and Sakura hesitate to even hurt a person. Why didn't it affect him so much?

Sai had just carried through like there would be no consequences following death.

-XIII-

The Lion and Pig mask seemed to mock Naruto after the many times Naruto created sets of shadow clones after sets of shadow clones in order to stall time. He was still stuck in the mud, and he had barely enough time to even attempt to get out before his shadow clones were finished within seconds.

It was because of the Lion-masked ANBU. The Lion-masked ANBU seemed to control shuriken around using many strings, manipulating the path and making somewhat of a large and deadly net to be caught within.

Naruto didn't have time to even think of another approach, so he continued to make shadows clones, until it all seemed like a joke being played over and over again.

"Give up! It can be either an easy or hard end," the pig said.

But the Lion ANBU seemed to hesistate.

Naruto grinned inwardly. That was good because he'd have to finish off the Lion before the Pig since the Lion was the defense for the Pig. So once again, Naruto sent out another mass of clones and then, quickly tossed out kunai as well, attempting to cut some stringer.

Naruto's eyes widened when he realized the strings _deflected _his blades.

"Haha!" the ever-arrogant Pig laughed loudly, boasting, "My comrade's strings here are chakra strands, so I wouldn't underestimate him if I were you."

Naruto cursed under his breath. There _had _to be a weakness that Naruto wasn't spotting.

He caught the Pig suddenly begin to form hand signs. The Pig would now attack. There was absolutely no time to lose at all!

"Earth Style!" the Pig yelled. "Mud Entombment!"

Naruto saw the mud suddenly animate and creep up his legs, covering him in the mud and quickly becoming hard like plaster. It was slowly building its way up to his head.

Naruto desperately attempted to make another jutsu, but to his dismay, the mud had already caked around his arms and was up to his neck.

Naruto cursed as he tried to keep his breath. But he couldn't think any longer…couldn't _breathe…_any longer.

"Kyah!" he heard a familiar voice yell.

There was a sound of impact and Naruto felt a wave of force go through the mud encasing.

"Sakura-chan?" Naruto exclaimed, mud chipping off and breaking into pieces to free him.

"And Sai," Sakura quickly added, holding out her hand to lift Naruto onto the hawk that Sai had recently created.

"Should I finish them off as well?" Sai asked.

"No…no, Sai…just…let's get away!" Sakura said, somewhat disturbed.

"What happened?" Naruto asked. "Did you guys just leave me or something?"

"We all got split," Sakura summarized. "I…Sai killed the two that attacked him and later the two that attacked me as well."

"They were disrupting our task," Sai excused himself.

Naruto thought a moment. "They're coming after us…" he said. "And they got us so quickly too…" he looked back in amazement and disbelief. Naruto looked in Sai's direction, shooting slightly accusing eyes at him. "Sai…I hate to say this again, but I'm not sure if you're trustworthy or not."

Sakura bit her lip. If only things weren't so complicated! She felt so bad for Sai, who was seemingly caught between two worlds of completely different fates and people.

Sai didn't react, but of course, he wasn't expected to. After a brief moment, Sai said, "I meant completely what I said the last time you told me that. I will change. I will be my own self."

Silence was held for a long, long time.

"It…it could all be an act," Naruto said slowly. In fact, Naruto wasn't sure what to do. Sai officially incorporated himself into the Team 7 family, however…

Sai lifted his hand to his ear and pulled the wiretap device out. Laying that down, he then reached into his bag for the scroll that activated summoning of his hit book and placed that down next to the wireless radio.

After a few hand signs, he set fire to the two and let the charcoal smoke rise into the air and reduce the Foundation equipment into ashes.

Sakura and Naruto could only watch Sai burn his ANBU belongings.

He was rejecting his past…

"That's not acting," Sai said.

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**Thanks for reading! Reviews and critiques well appreciated!**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	8. Chapter 8

**Again, appreciate the support! **

**Enjoy, as always.**

**Midori Fujiwara

* * *

**

"Hmph, enough travel for a day?" Anko asked Kakashi, when she noticed him drag a bit. She waited for a reply from him but it never came. "I'm not trying to mock you, Hatake. I don't want to stress you out. You know yourself that my stamina is considerably higher than your own."

Kakashi didn't reply, keeping travel at a consistent speed alongside Anko, not willing to give up his momentum. But Anko could feel Kakashi losing a bit of spirit in his gait.

Anko smirked to herself. Damn was he determined.

-XIII-

A few more hours passed and Anko was still pretty strong but Kakashi's breathing got deeper and harsher. Anko couldn't even imagine how great of a ninja he would have been if his chakra reserve was high. He would have been impossible to stop. But Anko guessed that's why there were limits.

"Kakashi," Anko said. "I'm not planning to lose my comrade after he knocks out, tired, and can't fight when the time actually comes."

"We're wasting time," Kakashi argued.

Anko thought quickly, "Well you're wasting energy that could otherwise help against Orochimaru."

"Hence we will rest so close to his hideout that we'll be there by the next day," Kakashi replied.

Anko didn't completely agree with Kakashi, but she did see his point. Still, Kakashi nor Anko could afford to lose even a drop of energy. All the chakra must go into finishing Orochimaru. She grit her teeth in the ambivalence.

She quickly ducked over closer to Kakashi, who ignored that she was nearing him. Anko waited for a moment, then put her head under Kakashi's left arm and forced his arm around her shoulders, holding his hand against her.

Anko straightened her back, taking some of Kakashi's weight to carry.

His silence indicated he demanded a reason, and she said, "I might as well take some burden off you since I've got extra chakra to spare."

Kakashi held himself from saying that he didn't need it, instead pulling at his hand, trying to get himself off Anko. It somewhat annoyed him how he was leaning on someone else to ease his travel; Kakashi felt that he could handle the extra pressure.

But Anko held his arm tightly around her shoulder, insisting that she should help him. Sure, Kakashi admired her sacrifice, but he truly felt he could still move on his own.

After some struggling, Kakashi demanded, "Anko, I can move on my own."

"I know you can," she quickly shot back. "But not with as much energy loss."

"Anko," Kakashi repated.

"I insist," Anko adamantly said. But she knew she had to watch the amount of chakra she was using now too. If she pushed herself too hard, her body would instinctively call on the foreign enzymes introducing the curse seal's power.

After a while of travel, Anko encountered a very awkward déjà vu moment. Somewhere in her unconscious she recalled carrying the same burden and traveling through a thickly wooded area.

Something seemed to be off.

"Kakashi…" Anko asked. "Do you…?"

His response was to push up his forehead protector and scan their surroundings with the Sharingan.

"They've come," he said at the same time Anko thought it.

"This is what you save energy for, Hatake," Anko proved her reason for helping Kakashi carrying himself those couple of hours past. Kunai needles extended to the palm of her hand and Kakashi braced for taijutsu, immediately setting themselves up for long-range and close combat.

Anko dropped Kakashi's arm and while slipping out of his grasp, swiveled around to toss the needles behind them. These projectiles were deflected, and Kakashi knocked each out of its ricocheted paths with the plates on the back of his gloves.

That ended their combined attack and they stood back to back to count the number of ANBU they had to face.

Six.

But wait…

All six ANBU looked identical to one another. The same hair, same uniform, and down to the same mask.

"Shit," Kakashi muttered.

"Don't tell me these are the newer recruits," Anko added. She put a kunai blade close to her mouth and tasted the metal. "What brats, they all wanted to be with each other and like each other all the time."

Right away, Anko realized Kakashi and her weakness would be the failure to identify each individual ANBU's strength and weaknesses.

"The Sharingan can distinguish," Kakashi reassured Anko.

"How much energy do you think this will take?" Anko asked quietly.

"Depends on their skill," Kakashi stated.

"Fortunately for you, you have just enough chakra left for a battle, hm?"

"Shut up," Kakashi said, but he said it like he was admitting Anko was right.

"They can't have too much chakra on hand either, since they've been tracking and scouting us all day and even attempted to trap us in a genjutsu…trying to get me running around in circles…"

"Remember we're not killing them," Kakashi reminded Anko.

"Hn," Anko replied and the kunai in her hand slightly faltered.

Kakashi noticed this and almost laughed, but Anko, being the impatient one, restarted the offense. She flung shuriken in a large circle. She let Kakashi take care of the ANBU who had chosen to dodge her shuriken, and released snakes from her sleeve to take hold of the ANBU units who simply stayed at their place and deflected her projectiles.

However the units' reaction times were faster than the amount of time it took for Anko's snakes to take hold of them. So instead, she took hold of tree trunks on both sides, and flung herself up into the air.

Noticing a unit behind Kakashi, who was kicking mid-air at yet another unit, Anko followed through with a heel to the opponent's stomach. At the same moment, Kakashi had struck his victim as well. Anko thought of an idea and released her snakes again to catch the two ninja. Anko pulled her arms together and the momentum of whiplashed snakes smashed the two ANBU bodies into each other.

This revealed to Anko and Kakashi that they were only replacements. Anko hadn't expected that and slowly began to fall back to the ground, but Kakashi located the true bodies of the ANBU promptly.

Anko assumed Kakashi got her back and she hurled out another round of kunai needles. Many of her projectiles were dodged, but she showered needles after needles to try to touch at least one.

At least she scratched three of the four units she hoped to get. The scratches on their masks would hopefully help in identifying one unit from the other.

All Anko had to do now was beat them one by one.

The ANBU assembled in a square around Anko, who was now surrounded. She gave nicknames to each of the units, according to the scratch marks she had placed. There was No Scratch Mark, Cheek, Forehead, and Nose.

So Anko waited a moment.

Nose whipped out his ninjatou from behind his back and seemed to add some of his chakra to the blade.

Anko quickly checked the status of his friends. Strangely enough, they didn't seem to be doing anything.

Nose charged and Anko flipped over his head to avoid Nose's attack, throwing out projectiles at No Scratch. No Scratch hadn't seen that coming and whipped out his own ninjatou to reflect Anko's projectiles. Anko spun mid-air, her foot flying to the side of No Scratch's face. No Scratch caught Anko's kick and Anko responded by hurling a snake-reinforced punch at his face.

No Scratch's mask broke into two, yet her attack never made it to his face. No Scratch had suddenly disappeared.

Anko, surprised, reached up to swing herself onto a branch overhead. Scanning the area again, she noticed that all the ANBU were gone and had disappeared.

Cursing when she realized her mistake, she twisted on her back just in time to see Nose gliding right over her, blade pointing straight out. Anko forced her leg to kick Nose from behind. She smirked when she felt impact but still wondered where the other ANBU comrades had went.

"Anko!" Kakashi yelled and she looked up, seeing yet another ANBU falling, coming down at her. The mask had no scratches. Was this ANBU her No Scratch or was he one of the ones Kakashi was dealing with?

Anko slashed his body with a kunai, drawing blood from his torso. So blood splattered on her face and her tongue instinctively whipped out to have a taste.

Metallic.

Seeing Kakashi beside her, she trusted him to cover her while she grabbed the injured ANBU to knock him unconscious. Following this, she assigned one of her serpents to swallow the ANBU whole.

That taken care of, Anko turned back to face Kakashi and threw a punch straight at his face.

-XIII-

"Good," Kakashi mused when he noticed Anko attack one of the ANBU who had disguised as himself. Kakashi hadn't been able to warn Anko, since he was too wound up in his own fight.

Unfortunately for him, the ones that he had chosen to take care of were extremely fast. Competition to his own speed. Kakashi could tell they were doing these quick movements so that Kakashi would be forced to use his Sharingan and thereby quickening the rate he would reach a chakra balance of zero. Keeping track of the two was irritating and Kakashi was getting tired.

But he noticed how they kept coming out with close-combat attacks and Kakashi knew that Raikiri had a spherical range. He considered whether or not to run more energy expenditure and decided there was nothing much better to do anyway. Even if Raikiri failed to at least paralyze them, they would be distracted enough to let Kakashi slip out of the fight and help Anko, who was up against four.

Why was it that she always insisted that she do the majority of the work?

Kakashi made his hand signs discreetly while brushing off bladed attacks and finally dispelled his justsu when he felt that enough energy had been collected. Rather than aiming at a specific person however, Kakashi twisted his chakra so that Raikiri would collapse instead.

After shocking his opponents, Kakashi tossed wire around the two and wrapped them together into a tight bundle. This action clonked their two head together, and the whole ANBU roll fell to join the swallowed and spit up ANBU, now all guarded by a rather large blue snake.

Kakashi used the snake's head as a base to jump off and joined Anko in her fight.

-XIII-

Anko swiveled around and pointed the kunai at Kakashi's right cheekbone.

Kakashi put his hands up defensively. "Anko, it's really me this time."

She smiled lightly. "I know," she said, but hiked up with her kunai anyway. She drew her kunai back to her mouth and tasted Kakashi's blood with a smirk on her face as she turned back around to study the remaining opponents.

"Sadistic freak," Kakashi murmured loud enough for Anko to hear.

"I have my reasons," she replied, still examining the remaining ANBU.

Cheek, Nose, and Forehead were still left. Anko didn't mention anything to Kakashi in case the enemies could hear her discuss her trick, but she hoped Kakashi would notice the slight differences in the ANBU's appearance.

They all stood there, studying each other, three against two.

Anko couldn't put her finger on it, but the scratches that she had inflicted on them didn't seem right to her.

Cheek's scratch was a straight diagonal going from bottom to up in a 35 degree angle. Forehead's scratch, however, was almost parallel to the ground. Nose's scratch curved a bit, and was at a sharper angle.

If all three of them were facing the side to dodge when Anko had thrown her needles so all of the scratches made sense.

But there was still something wrong…

Kakashi stood still in a fighting stance beside her. He seemed like he was thinking as well, but she didn't want to try to figure out exactly what. It wasn't like she had the time to analyze his face and take her attention off the shinobi in front of them.

She still couldn't believe that Tsunade had gone so far to…would Tsunade go so far to retrieve them? Were they even told to attack? Perhaps the ANBU were just defending themselves?

Anko suddenly realized.

"You took down two, right?" Anko asked Kakashi.

"Yes."

"We counted six in the beginning, right?"

"Yes."

Anko grit her teeth. There were three in front of them and three knocked out.

But…

"There's still another one," Anko warned Kakashi.

"But I thought you took care of one," he said and glanced around with his Sharingan.

"Yes…but the one I took down wasn't a real unit. The one I took down was just made of wood. I never realized it because I had summoned a snake to deal with him…it."

"How do you—"

"The one with a scratch on his cheek. I couldn't have made it, if I had really made it myself, the kunai needle would have went through his eye," Anko quickly explained. "He made the scratch himself to stimulate that he was one of the four I was dealing with, when in fact, he's been switching masks around."

"The one that attacked you with a chakra blade was wood?"

"I'm assuming that material but yes, it was only hurled at me, never a living person with self-induced movement."

"Hn," Kakashi said. "You're not that dense after all."

Anko slipped shuriken into her hands from her sleeves. "You just didn't know," she replied. "Cover me."

"Already done," he said and put a peace hand sign up.

Kakashi attacked the ANBU first, appearing from underground with a clone. Anko, seeing the three distracted, hurled her shuriken at them. She suddenly realized that Kakashi had meant he had two clones out with his peace sign, and she assumed the Kaashi standing next to her was a clone as well.

Anko's shuriken were offset by a few kunai that pinned her projectiles down and preventing them from injuring the ANBU.

There, that was where the last ANBU was. She figured Kakashi was already on it because the clone next to her stopped her from going after the hidden ANBU.

Anko made a few seals and slapped her hand down to the ground. Snakes seeped out from underneath the ground, quick as bullets, to bit the three opposing ANBU.

Only one of the ANBU was bitten.

That ANBU froze, paralyzed. The other two ANBU, suddenly distracted at the loss of their comrade, put their guards down for a moment.

Anko and Kakashi, holding the same wire, tied the three ANBU together, the trap completed. Anko made quick tie while Kakashi pressed both ANBU on a pressure point, knocking the remaining two out.

One more.

She heard a branch crack and Kakashi appeared, brushing his hands.

"Last one's taken care of," he said, and the clone by Anko disappeared.

"Liar," she mocked, crossing her arms.

"Do you really think I'm that weak of a shinobi?" Kakashi asked with a tone of fake pain.

"Maybe," Anko said, stepping up to him and putting his arm around her shoulder. "If you think you're so strong, help me walk some so that we can rest and make camp, okay?"

Kakashi shrugged, annoyed, but his arm went under her knee so that he was carrying her bridal position.

"Thanks, sweetie. It's payback for how I helped you out before," she smiled and wiped blood off the nick that she had presented him with before. She tasted his blood again, relishing the flavor and really contemplating over its uniqueness.

Then, so quickly that he didn't notice, she twisted his neck and decapitated him with her bare hands.

-XIII-

His body fell to the ground and Anko reconfigured her standing position, tossing his head back near the rest of him.

"Jesus," Kakashi said, stepping out of the brush. "For sure, I thought you had been tricked. " He tucked the kunai he was about to use away.

Anko made an expression like she had tasted something bad.

"His blood was a tad sweeter than yours," Anko explained.

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**Hm...this chapter was a bit hmm...what do you think? I'm good at explaining fight scenes?**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	9. Chapter 9

**I want to really thank my readers, who have been so consistent in giving me feedback and showing me lot of support! An author couldn't have asked for anything more.**

**Enjoy.**

**Midori Fujiwara

* * *

**

Orochimaru waited patiently for Sasuke to complete the final move. Following that single moment, all the set-up targets encircled in layers of offense around him fell to the ground. Even the victims died elegantly, but in no comparison to the swiftness of the younger Sharingan heir.

Orochimaru's tongue trailed over his lips in telltale satisfaction. But he coughed, covering his mouth, and blood droplets appeared on his hand when he took them away. Still, Orochimaru raised his head to take in a glimpse of his host's body.

Sasuke turned around stiffly. "Orochimaru," he said, without a title or tone or respect. "Can you do that?"

Orochimaru smirked and disregarded the question. It didn't matter if Orochimaru could do the same as Sasuke or not, their skills, abilities, power, strength, wit, and body would became one after the ritual. The time was coming soon and Orochimaru could feel his soul itching to get out of his old body. The skin of his current host was becoming too tight around the ever increasing size of Orochimaru as he collected more and more souls to live and feed off of for energy and life.

Sasuke's body wouldn't last forever either. But the eyes could be implanted and replanted, experience and power regained. Sasuke would serve as his soul's home for that short time—or maybe even longer, considering his body's resilience—and within that time, he'd be able to accomplish it all.

Access to new terrains to jutsu.

He'd be able to mimic and learn each jutsu with simply a glance.

Then following that, he'd work on figuring out how to create kekkai genkai jutsus in a person originally unable to perform those—like himself.

Orochimaru had succeeded in gene splicing, and achieved the wood element in one of his experiments. But he had to find out how wind and ice combined or how water and lightning increased each other's powers. He had to continue his research, but of course he wouldn't do that while in Sasuke's body. He wouldn't waste a second and learn every single power. New lands, new jutsus, new techniques, new powers, new ways…

Then eventually he would make the superhuman.

Sasuke waited for Orochimaru's answer.

"Your friends are coming to save you," Orochimaru said, instead of answering Sasuke's question. "Do you remember them?"

Sasuke sheathed his sword behind him, and thought before replying, "Of course."

"They were your—"

"No longer," Sasuke interrupted. "I couldn't care less that they were coming to visit. I can't afford to spend any more time with them. They are weaker and they will drag me down with them."

Orochimaru smiled, but even he was a bit astounded by how intensely Sasuke took his mission to get revenge on his older brother.

Not even Orochimaru himself had that much hate. Sasuke…how perfect he was.

Orochimaru could have never believed what luck he had that all these little coincidences added up. His success was a sure sign that he was doing the right thing. His success was a sure sign that he would fulfill to create the ultimate human being.

"You won't even bother to greet them?" Orochimaru asked. "Not even a little scratch to remind them you no longer care?"

"They'll die before getting here," Sasuke shrugged off Orochimaru's reasoning.

Orochimaru thought a bit more cautiously. Sasuke's friends were formidable enemies…one of them with the Sharingan himself, the other a jinchuuriki—a beautiful specimen of pure power-, and a medically specialized ninja that had trained under Tsunade herself.

Not only that, but his previous experiment was on her way as well.

_Anko…_Orochimaru licked his lips. _You truly have missed your sensei…_

They would get in the way of many things.

Orochimaru, therefore, dispatched a few of his own fighters to kill down Sasuke's friends and finish off his apprentice once and for all.

He should have killed her in the first place.

She knew too much.

-XIII-

Kakashi and Anko both collapsed when they reached a small cavern they thought suitable to rest in. Kakashi sat down, staring at the cave's walls and dirt but Anko looked out into the landscape from where she stood.

Anko could almost make out where Orochimaru's hideout was from here. They were miles and miles away, but the height of this particular cliff allowed her to see far beyond country borders.

They were coming closer, and her life was getting shorter. Her chance would come soon, but almost as immediately as death.

Kakashi turned his head up to Anko's weary figure.

"Sit down, Anko," Kakashi suggested.

She seemed lost in thought however.

Kakashi waited a moment and then tried a different approach. "Anko, you're blocking my view." But she really wasn't. God, she was so tiny…Orochimaru would wipe her out in a second.

Anko crumpled to the floor. Kakashi soon realized that it wasn't to rest, but because she was in pain. Her hand clasped over the base of her neck—

Shit.

Kakashi stepped over by Anko, who didn't respond to her name, gritting her teeth and shaking, curling into a little ball. Anko had probably used more chakra than she had expected to.

Kakashi could have sworn that her curse seal had been pronounced dormant. Why then, was it activating? Perhaps…it was never really gone?

"Anko? Hey, Anko?" Kakashi asked, trying again once more to get her response.

He received a loud cry of pain instead, and she half-collapsed against him.

Her body was burning hot like she had a fever.

Kakashi was suddenly reminded of Sasuke. It was like experiencing it all over again.

Kakashi cursed mentally when he remembered that by this time it was too late to help. Anko's body had to accept it, or win the fight against her seal.

And he could do nothing but stare.

Her whole body trembled, and the vibrations even carried through his own body.

Not sure how to comfort her, he simply let her lean sideways against him and half-embraced her. Her rough, constrained bereathing sounded hollow and raspy.

"Fucking shit," he heard her curse and felt her arm push herself away from Kakashi. Now instead, she supported herself with her free arm that wasn't clasped against her neck. Her eyes were still tightly closed and beads of sweat formed along her hairline. Her hand grasped at the dirt.

"Anko?"

"No! Just…shut up!" Anko managed before a pained yell erupted from her throat. "Shit, shit, shit…" she repeated over and over again in a mantra as she breathed through her grit teeth.

Kakashi stepped up to Anko again, trying to figure out if there was something he could do.

"No, don't help me!" Anko said, kicking at the ground to move a foot away from him. Kakashi froze for a while, and she explained harshly, "If I…can't deal with _this _on my own, how can I…even try to look him in the eye?" Kakashi heard more hard breathing. But then he began to hear muffled sobs. Indistinctly he heard her mutter, "I can't do it…I can't do it…I'm too weak…fucking shit!"

Splotches of tears spotted the dirt and Kakashi was feeling all the more useless. He began to get angry himself, and he knew there was no point in getting angry, so he just began to get even more pissed off.

After a long silence with only breathing, Anko said, "Kakashi…talk to me? About something…a-anything!" Her eyes were still tightly closed and her breathing still ragged.

Kakashi struggled to say something.

"Something!" Anko demanded, rage poking at her voice.

"What's your favorite food, Anko?" Kakashi finally blurted out, realizing she wanted conversation to get her mind off pain.

"I love dango," Anko answered. "Any flavor, any style, any amount…I would eat all the dango I'm ever given!"

"Anything else that isn't sweet? Like ramen?"

"The spicy shrimp one at Ichiraku isn't that bad," she admitted. "But I hate all other spicy foods!" she struggled to catch her breathe. Cursing, but still open to conversation.

"What about drinks? What drinks do you prefer?"

"I really like the—fuck!" Anko paused so that she could writhe in agony. One hand punched the ground. "Kakashi," she cried, fresh tears blurring her words. "This isn't working!"

Kakashi was estatic, cursing mentally. Shit, what to do now? How the fuck would he be able to help?

Kakashi looked at Anko's agonized figure again.

_Orochimaru….you bastard, _he thought. _You're definitely going to feel something once I get to you. I will beat the living shit out of you and make sure your soul doesn't escape hell. You ruined practically the lives of everyone I care about…and every one of the ones they care about too!_

No word could express the immense hatred Kakashi felt at the particular moment, and Kakashi had never thought he could become this agitated.

"Oh god, I'd rather die," Anko whimpered. But after a few more moments, her shaking stopped altogether, and her body fell flat against the ground, knocked out.

Only then did Kakashi notice the marks had traveled more than halfway across her face and tattooed over her left arm and leg.

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**:D **

**Midori Fujiwara**


	10. Chapter 10

**Double digits on chapters! Thanks so much for the support despite my procrastination! Your patience is priceless!**

**Special call out to NinjaSheik, Colonel Hatake, Prescripto13, and Deviltrigger Dante! You guys have really been sticking to me like sushi rice! :D**

**Midori Fujiwara

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When Anko woke up, she felt as though she had been underwater, gasping for air, when she finally reached the surface. Her first breath was a gasp, and her eyes were wide open. She sat up straight and abruptly.

"Anko!" Kakashi exclaimed.

Anko mentally cursed. He had seen her when she was out of control. He probably thought of her as so weak…Kakashi was right, how could she have hoped to even scratch Orochimaru?

Anko grimaced and pat the base of her neck. Her cool hand burned against the seal. Never did she ever remember that intense of a pain. How…how had she been able to face that same pain when she was so young that long time ago?

"Anko, are you alright?"

"Never any better," Anko shot back sarcastically, her breathing still deep. She didn't mean to be angry toward Kakashi, but she had to be angry at _someone _in order to let out her steam.

Anko stood, and Kakashi pushed her down.

"Anko, you really can't. Just…rest. I….I'm sorry," he said to her.

"It isn't your fucking fault," she reminded him, jerking away from his touch.

"I mean, that I couldn't do anything…or…I should have remembered your chakra couldn't be pushed so far…"

Anko shook her hand, refusing to meet his eyes. "I _hate _him," she muttered. "I _hate _him so much."

But Anko felt as though she was only saying these words, because somewhere in her unconscious he was still her father. The one and only man she idolized and looked up to…

She cursed again, but audibly this time.

Her situation was starting to seem all the more hopeless, all the more quixotic. What was she thinking those few days back? She had been way too confident in herself. She couldn't even _make _it to where he was without help. Had Kakashi never set out himself, she would have long since been dead.

Anko shifted thought gears. But that was history, that no longer mattered. She was out here, and she had to continue.

She looked back at Kakashi, who stood coolly to the side of her. But she noticed the concern in his eye. She looked away from him, and then said, "Come on, let's go." She stood up to emphasize her decision.

Kakashi explicitly disapproved. "I know we only have a few more days, but you can't even move well. We'll rest for another couple of hours. And actually rest, don't just sit there. You want all the energy you can get."

"I want to get this all over with," Anko corrected him. "You're not stopping me." She stepped out of the cavern's entryway and out into the light morning.

"Your curse seal," Kakashi reminded her.

Anko stood stiffly a few moments. "What about it?"

"It's growing."

Anko shrugged. "I don't care. That's all the more reason."

So Kakashi could do nothing but follow behind her.

Kakashi lifted his hitai-ate.

The Sharingan observed her chakra. He saw two massive sources of energy. One of them was at her abdomen, her own chakra, and the other was at the base of her neck. Already she was relying on the curse mark's power. She wouldn't last much longer without the curse mark's side effects.

What he had seen yesterday was curse mark activated, level one. From his experience with Sasuke, at level one, there was an insane amount of pain that ate away at the user's body with ever second of usage. At level one, there was also uncontrollable urges to kill, to destruct, to ruin…and usually recklessly, at the body's attempt to use the excessive amount of energy.

"Kakashi?" she asked. "Why are you here again?"

By 'here', he didn't know if that meant 'here' as in following her and not resting, or 'here' as in taking on this self-induced mission altogether.

"I'm going to save Sasuke before it's too late," Kakashi answered, to avoid replying the wrong way.

"Sasuke can save himself," she mumbled, but Kakashi heard.

"But he's not going to," Kakashi objected. "He'll do anything to get at Itachi. His mere existence rides on the death of that man."

Kakashi's Sharingan noticed a sudden pump of chakra emitting from Anko's body. Strangely it didn't seem like her own, but it didn't appear like the cursemark's as well...

Kakashi glanced around for a second before rushing at Anko in order to scoop her up and away from an opponent's attack. Where she had been standing, there was now a large crater.

They were under attack again.

But the ANBU were well-defeated, even if they weren't killed, and the fighting style Kakashi just saw was not familiar to the Leaf Village.

Then Kakashi realized: these were Orochimaru's henchmen. Orochimaru had already sensed them coming. That meant that Anko was right, in a way, because that meant there really was no time to lose. But it was an unfair game. The faster they would travel, the greater the chance of them being unsuccessful. But the slower they traveled in order to maintain their chakra, the greater amount of time Orochimaru had to reuse his ritual.

Kakashi turned against himself. It's because he was always late. He was too late to save Sasuke, too late to stop Naruto, too late to defeat Orochimaru…and now, too late to save Anko.

He heard Anko stand up next to him, ready for battle.

"Come out, bitches! I don't have time to waste!" Anko snarled. Her muscles were still tense from her previous struggle against the curse mark.

Kakashi measured how much strength he had recovered. It wasn't much…but…

He made three lightening clones, meant to explode once damaged. The shinobi they were up against were close-combat type, Kakashi could tell, because the long-range jutsu they had just used was earth-based, and very weakly done at that. Besides, long-range fighters liked instant kill, while close-combat shinobi used their weaker long-range techniques to test opponent strength. So when the lightening clones exploded while fighting, the opponents _should _theoretically be in range to receive damage.

And if not…well then he himself would have to take care of the rest.

"No, Anko," he said, "You take care of yourself."

Anko didn't like being told she couldn't do things for herself and wasn't good enough to fend on her own, but she knew it was true already and for this one time, physically backed down. She grit her teeth, but obeyed.

Then the shower of kunai hailed on them. Kakashi was already out of the way, along with his clones, but he hadn't managed to take Anko out of harm's way as well.

Anko made a few quick hand signs and shot a fireball up into the air that melted the projectiles. Ashes fell over her face and she couldn't see for a moment.

She did hear however, and heard a few opponents step closer to her. But then she heard more thumps and realized Kakashi was taking care of them already. There was a sudden squeak of electricity and a final thump landed on the ground.

Anko waved her hand through the ash to let things clear up, but she couldn't. There was a bit too much ash that she expected, so she realized the opponent had set an ash cloud around her vicinity to decrease visibility.

She saw a figure stand beside her.

"Anko, you're alright?" Kakashi's voice asked.

"Why yes I am," she said, noting how defenseless Kakashi was making her seem.

He used a few hand signs and made a thick rain descend over the ash cloud, making the ash fall heavy to the ground so that the air cleared up.

That revealed the next opponent waiting for them, who struck at Kakashi with a knife that actually seemed to be part of the opponent's hand. That was a bad idea, because that Kakashi was a clone and the current ran along the sharp blade of the enemy.

The enemy was paralyzed for a moment, but his eyes quickly reflected hatred and that turned against Anko. Anko picked herself up , and let pain wash over her as she allowed the curse mark to let the remaining chakra in her body come to rise.

She felt a sudden jerk within her body, but then she was gratified with the energy she was provided. _Yes, _she though. _This was the power rush._

It was just like she had imagined in the dream: she had given in to the night, and let the power of the foreign seal take control of her. The feeling was so ecstatic, so fulfilling, so full of pleasure that Anko had no idea how to describe the euphoria she experienced.

Just like in her dream.

Some conscious smaller part of her body was stunned that she let her control over the mark go, but the majority relished it.

_Now, _Anko thought, _it is time to deal some impact. Now is my time to shine._

Demonic speed allowed her to pass behind her opponent and make several hand signs for her Dragon Fire jutsu. The fire she let out glowed a bright white, powerful that she couldn't reach keeping the curse mark dormant. God, how she enjoyed this rush. Cries of pain erupted, and fire surrounded her, but all Anko felt was her own hatred, and shadows of pain pulsing through her whole body.

-XIII-

Anko awoke, finding herself lying on cool ground. She tried to grasp the air around her but could feel no movement in her limbs. She was so worn out, so tired. What the hell had she been doing? Then a faint pulse of pain reminded her how she had opened the curse seal.

But wait, wasn't she under attack? Why was it so peaceful then? A genjutsu?

"Anko."

Speak of the devil.

"Kakashi," she acknowledged.

"Your seal activated," he said simply.

Anko replied, "I know." She didn't mention that had allowed it to as well.

"You killed everyone," he continued.

"Good."

Anko looked at Kakashi. "What about you? What did you do while I was busy in murder?" She glanced at his arm, which had a nice gash on it. "You just watched my grace?"

Kakashi didn't reply, and let her observe his wound for a big longer.

Anko forced her weak body to sit up, and Kakashi looked as though he was surprised she could even move, let alone support herself.

"Nice slash on the arm, Hatake," she smirked. "And here you are telling me to get behind you so I wouldn't get hurt."

But Kakashi didn't appear to be offended by Anko's insult to his accused hypocrisy. He sighed, "Anko…you did that with some of that good skill of yours."

Anko froze. But…what? She stared at the crimson wound on his arm. No…that couldn't have been her. She'd never actually attack him…and not only that she hadn't remembered tasting his blood a second time. She had only aimed for Orochimaru's men! She knew she couldn't have possibly attacked her own comrade!

"No, Kakashi," Anko denied. "That couldn't have been me. I…I wouldn't attack you!"

"You were out of control," Kakashi reminded her.

Cold sweat ran down Anko's neck and back. "No…" she repeated, looking down at her two hands. "I _couldn't _have."

"Anko…that's why you've been told all your life to never give into the seal's power. With it, the seal takes over you and transforms you into a completely new person. The seal only needs a body to thrive in. And once you let it…" Kakashi trailed off.

Anko still sat frozen.

Kakashi sat silently for a while before getting up. "Well, that doesn't matter anymore. Come on, Anko."

Anko reached for Kakashi's outstretched hand, on the arm that wasn't torn up.

"Kakashi, I'm sorry," she said.

He stopped in his tracks and turned around, expressionless. He stared at her for a long while, considering his options.

"I might just have enough chakra to seal—"

"No," Anko suddenly objected. "I'm not going to seal this curse away."

Kakashi was taken aback. Hadn't he just heard her apologize and regret using the curse mark's power? Why was she objecting to a safety precaution by sealing the evil away now? Kakashi had done so successfully for Sasuke already, why would there be any reason not to work?

"Anko, it's dangerous even to you."

"I said no," Anko said. She looked away and then back at Kakashi, making her point straight with him with eye contact. "I don't care if it takes over me."

Kakashi was object to open his mouth to reject and argue back, but Anko sensed his objection and interrupted him before a word could escape his lips.

"Don't you _understand_?" Anko asked, smiling. "This curse will allow me to reach my mission! This curse mark will increase my success rate at least one hundred and fifty times. I have to keep it and use it so that I might be able to defeat him."

"No Anko I'm not—"

"This curse mark is the most potent chakra source I have ever experienced," Anko said. "You're _not _taking that power away from me."

"How can you trust it? It was put on you by Orochimaru himself! And what if it activates on its own? And look at yourself, Anko, self-destruction is not how you can effectively win."

Anko put her hand on Kakashi's shirt collar and his face close to her own. "I swear Kakashi, that I will show Orochimaru that I hate him. And I swear, never to let myself off track again. The next time I use the seal, its power will be for Orochimaru's death only. I will give him a taste of his own medicine." Anko's voice softened. "So reconsider Hatake."

Kakashi didn't bother to reject and pushed her away from him, implying he did not want to be that close to anyone.

Anko watched Kakashi walk slowly in the direction of their travel once again. "But I'm sorry Kakashi. I promise it's never going to happen again," she apologized solemnly, following behind him.

Kakashi sighed, "Mitarashi has yet to learn that promises are only words."

"Hatake has yet to learn that Anko Mitarashi keeps her promises straight through," she shot back.

-XIII-

Orochimaru had been informed that Anko had used the curse mark to defeat his previously sent out troops.

He grinned. She was a little late, but there she was, using the mark that she had kept dormant for so long.

The curse mark fed off misery, hate, and despair. The more Anko would have any of this, the stronger the mark became, and the less able she'd be to operate on her own.

"So…how many of my men were left?"

"Zero, Lord Orochimaru."

Orochimaru licked his lips.

He had always known Anko carried potential.

He sighed deeply. "All of them."

"Finished, Lord Orochimaru. Dead."

Orochimaru sighed again. "Everyone's useless…" he muttered.

But he wanted to test Anko's power again.

"Iki, Hakushi, Moumoku…" Orochimaru said.

"Hai," the three said, and vanished from sight.

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**Hope you guys enjoyed the installment! :D Next one is getting thrown right at you...in slow motion Matrix speed.**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	11. Chapter 11

**So originally I had pre-typed a few chapters in case something got in the way. I'm really bad with commitment...and I'm still trying to figure out if I should participate in Nanowrimo and crank out a novel. It really isn't that much; I'm just too lazy...well whatever, I'll probably do it for the hell of it anyway.**

**But enough ranting, enjoy.**

**Midori Fujiwara**

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Kakashi still didn't like the idea that Anko believed the cursed seal's power should be valued. He still wanted to persuade her to seal it because its power was unstable. And not only that, she was harmed by utilizing its chakra as well.

He turned to Anko. "Anko…doesn't it hurt when you use the seal?" he asked directly.

After traveling for a few minutes, Anko couldn't believe this is what he wanted to talk about after all that time. And, he was bringing up a subject they had already argued over. Did he intend to try to persuade her to his reasoning again?

"Yes it does hurt, Kakashi," she replied nevertheless. But before Kakashi could say another word, she added, "but the power I'm granted is all worth it in the end."

Kakashi breathed in to utter a word, but thought better and kept his mouth shut. But he noticed that she was breathing rather heavily.

The curse mark demanded lots of energy as well.

Kakashi scanned the surroundings they were traveling through. They were extremely vulnerable to attack. Sure, the ANBU were taken care of—knocked unconscious—and Orochimaru's men were dead in Anko's rage, but that didn't mean there was no one else after them.

Kakashi was tiring himself, and Anko didn't seem to have too much energy left either. Kakashi had lost a decent amount in the injury Anko had given to him, and he'd physically need rest sooner or later.

What would just suck was if they got attacked at this particular moment.

Imagine Kakashi's luck when two shinobi suddenly appeared out of the brushes ahead of them.

They didn't even bother making a surprise entrance—completely confident that Kakashi and Anko would be capable of inflicting much damage.

Anko hissed, recognizing the smell of Orochimaru on their clothing, roped in the same manner of the Sound Country shinobi.

Both Anko and Kakashi could tell something seemed to be off with these two opponents; however, neither could put their finger on it.

Anko brushed her cautiousness off and whipped out two kunai, running her tongue along both to test the sharpness. Metal stung her tongue, and satisfied, Anko threw out a shower of needles with her other hand, coming in for an attack after her projectiles.

Kakashi didn't support Anko's recklessness, and so watched her fight, hoping to get some clue about the opponents, while setting a trap discreetly and replacing his form with a clone.

The two opponents gracefully dodged Anko's projectiles. Assuming they were distracted, Anko charged at one of them while her foot prepared to extended in order to block off the other.

But her kunai never hit her target.

Her kunai swished against some invisible barrier. She slashed at it, but could see nothing between her target and herself.

Yet an invisible barrier prevented her blades from tasting the enemy's blood. Anko slashed at the barrier quickly before retreating, nothing black liquid trailing behind the damage her kunai would have made.

Anko's eyes narrowed. What the hell was this?

She leapt back to meet up with Kakashi again, rather his clone, making sure not to set off any triggers of his trap.

The white-haired enemy laughed mockingly, turquoise eyes glinting with satisfaction. His companion had a bandage over both eyes, and Anko suddenly wondered how the second had dodged all her needles.

Were these two connected in some way?

"Are you done with your move yet?" the first one asked.

Anko grit her teeth, sneaking a glance at Kakashi's composure. He was tense, but his face was as calm and as stoic as ever. He hadn't even lifted his hitai-ate to check things out with his Sharingan yet.

Kakashi's eyes caught Anko's eyes and a speechless conversation took place between them within split-seconds. Anko looked back to the opponents.

She had to be careful not to push her chakra too hard. Otherwise she'd risk injuring Kakashi with the awakening of the curse seal, and Anko wanted to keep her words with meaning.

She created three shadow clones, and sent each one out on a different task. She herself made a few hand signs and had snakes extend from her sleeves, intending to capture the opponent and wipe the smirk off his face.

As expected, her clones were finished off, but that took his focus off just enough for her to be able to take hold of him.

His bandaged and apparently blind partner tried to prevent harm to his companion and quickly made his way over to stop Anko's capture, but set off a trap by stepping out of the perimeter that Kakashi had previously set.

The bandaged opponent blocked the incoming kunai with a swish of a large shuriken in front of him, and Kakashi took the opportunity to attack from underground, rising up underground behind the bandaged opponent and charging a bit of lightening through his punch.

But Kakashi was interrupted by the sensation of a sharp point against his back. He realized he was attacking a clone and whipped around to defend himself from any further harm.

The two had a good taijutsu combat, and Kakashi could figure out how the blind opponent could be so accurate, blocking each attack and landing his own perfectly. Unless the fabric around the opponent's eyes wasn't as opaque as it looked to be, or unless his companion shared vision with him…

"When you don't have sight…" the opponent explained. "You see so much more through your ears."

Kakashi decided to leave it at that. So his opponent had extremely sensitive hearing.

But Kakashi had other plans he could take and implement as well.

Anko, on the other hand, was successful in grabbing hold of her opponent.

Or so she though.

Her snakes simply passed through his body.

What? A genjutsu? A technique?

Anko furrowed her eyebrows. She had her snakes retreat back into her sleeves. First, some weird barrier and now a body that was like air! Was this an ultimate defense? She watched Kakashi struggle with his own opponent, flipping here and there for a match of taijutsu.

Anko decided that more than one person had to take care of either of these opponents. She had to help out Kakashi, but couldn't if her opponent was still concentrated on her.

If the opponent can't be attacked…

Anko set off her own trap, and a large barrier trapped her opponent into a cage of snake skin. She made sure her opponent was trapped within the cage before running over to help Kakashi.

However, once again she was blocked by some invisible barrier. Anko's teeth grit. What was this shield? Both opponents had it? And how…what exactly was it? How could either opponent even think of defending when they were directly under attack from two directions?

Anko clicked off some possibilities in her head.

But then Kakashi's clone was damaged and disappeared. She had no idea about Kakashi's true location, but she knew that she didn't want to deal with both of the opponents on her own.

What to do now?

Anko was grossly in thought trying to figure out what to do to counter their counters that she didn't notice the blind opponent about to attack her. It was too late for her by the time she noticed, and Anko felt blade bite her cheek, tasting her own blood.

Anko cursed and checked to see how the other opponent was doing. He still seemed like he was trapped in her snakeskin. So Anko could concentrate on the one in front of her. She made a few hand signs and let fire out of her lungs in a Fireball Technique.

Suddenly, her technique seemed very weak in comparison to what she was doing the last fight with the curse mark. The curse mark was itching to be used, telling her that with it she was capable of doing so much more…

But Anko resisted the urge to depend on a foreign source of power, choosing to fight on her own accord.

However, Anko was never good at close combat, and began to fall behind, unable to keep up with the fast movements of the enemy.

Anko's kunai was knocked out of her hand and she cursed, seeing the opponent's blade come down on her.

Then she noticed a blur come between them. Kakashi!

Kakashi took the blow with the metal plate of his glove and continued her fight.

"Anko!" he called. "There _has _to be another shinobi hidden that is making this fight harder than it's supposed to be with only two people. There _has _to be someone else. _Find _that third person!" he commanded to her, whispering quickly in her ears when she came up to the side of him.

She nodded and put a scroll down on the ground after processing a few hand signs. A hissing sound erupted from the ground. Anko had summoned her chakra tracker snakes, hoping they would lead to the nearby hidden enemy. In the meantime, Anko took care of the opponent she had trapped in snakeskin, surprised he hadn't tried to even escape.

She slowly stepped up to her prisoner, who still carried a smug smile on his face.

"And what are you so excited about?" Anko snarled, angry that her opponent was mocking her.

Her white-haired opponent just kept the smile in his face. Anko didn't waste anymore time. She would roast him inside the snakeskin and compress her body while the skin dried and tightened up.

After performing the mandatory hand signs, Anko hurled a large fireball in front of her. The smoke and heat cleared, but yet her opponent appeared unscathed and completely free of injury. He held the now shriveled snakeskin in his hands.

Anko got even more pissed.

But she related this incident to the one before. Excluding the invisible barrier she had bumped into a few times, her opponent's body didn't seem to have substance.

Rather than being solid material, her opponent's body had the qualities of air. Completely penetrable but unable to harm. Anko wondered if that meant he couldn't attack her physically as well.

In any case, even if he was a ghost, Anko sought to end his life again.

Her fire element jutsu didn't seem to have any effect on him, but the earth-style snake skin prison held him in. Unless he was acting, Anko assumed that earth –style jutsu would work best against him, or at least disable him.

Still, it bothered her that his body had no substance. She had made no scratch or mark on him, and he hadn't even took on the offensive side yet.

Unless…he didn't do offense, and his blind sidekick died.

Anko clapped her hands in front of her. She shaped her fingers into a sequence of hand signs and ended, putting her left hand against the ground. Nothing happened for a while, and then a vortex began to form, shifting leaves around and tossing loose branches up into a circle.

Her opponent clamped his jaw hard.

Anko smirked. Her "ghost" opponent had to have some weakness. He was just air? So let her push him around a bit.

Anko stepped out of her vortex's range, allowing the center to encase her opponent in a wall of superspeed air. She waited for her wind to pick up even further, until she could no longer see her enemy within the hurricane she created. Then she produced some more chakra and shot it out toward the center and the current snaked around until finally stabbing at her opponent. Anko forced another string of chakra. This was practically her last jutsu, it would take up the rest of the remaining chakra she had.

That meant it _had _to work, she couldn't just waste energy.

She added a little more chakra into the whole mess, and then, exhausted, released control of her wind-jutsu. This jutsu, she called, Viper Strike Vortex. Which was a little bit of the spiral Fireball Technique, some wind manipulation, and her own unique twist with serpents. It was new, and she had never used it in battle before, and, even during training, had never reached that extent in utilizing it.

Neither did she realize how much energy the jutsu would actually take until she almost tripped on herself, stepping backwards to observe what impact she made.

Winds sideswept and disappeared; what was left was nothing.

Anko's eyes widened. Don't tell her…the enemy had escaped and she had been attacking nothing the whole time?

"Shit," she cursed, and she glanced over to see how Kakashi was doing. Kakashi was well-occupied and she doubted he could handle becoming her back-up as well.

And he had mentioned there was another enemy lurking. Her summoned snakes hadn't found the extra shinobi yet…whoever was the third was pretty far away…or perhaps time hadn't been passing as quickly as she had thought.

A dead silence passed over and Anko returned her sight to the area where her opponent had once been.

"Nice technique…" a voice said, the enemy's no doubt. "But…"

Anko couldn't keep her mouth from dropping her jaw when she saw droplets of moisture suddenly come together and reform her opponent's body.

Anko cursed. A body that could reconfigure itself in the form of water droplets?

That's when she realized Kakashi's chakra affinity would be very advantageous—

"Moumoku! Formation, now!" her opponent commanded to his partner.

They had a plan, too? Shit!

Kakashi seemed fazed as well. Anko and him had an eye-conversation and agreed that working individually wasn't working well, but they had no choice because there were more than two enemies, one of which was hidden.

Within the moment Kakashi was paying attention, Moumoku, the blind enemy, kicked Kakashi's abdomen hard enough to throw him off his feet, about to land on Anko.

Anko put her arms in an X in front of her to block the impact for when Kakashi would come crashing down on her. However, she thought better of the situation. How to protect herself and not harm Kakashi? She doubted she could manage to carry his body weight and momentum.

But that didn't matter anymore, because the opponent now stepped to Anko and kicked her up as well, sending her body toward Kakashi's.

They were using Anko's and Kakashi's own bodies against themselves!

The two hit each other, back to back, and crumpled to the ground, coughing, but standing up soon after.

Anko leaned on Kakashi's back. They exchanged some quick words, but were interrupted upon noticing Anko's opponent create clones to surround the two in a perfect circle.

Anko noticed Moumoku on a tree branch overhead. "They're expecting us to go up to avoid his clone attacks," she said.

Kakashi did some quick thinking as the clones of the opponent came charging at them.

"Anko, press yourself against me!" Kakashi said, putting together a hand sign sequence.

She didn't ask any questions.

Then she heard the familiar sounds of Kakahsi's Chidori and saw powerful blue currents surround herself and him.

Genius, he had used Chidori as a defensive field, and the opponent seemed to be of water-elemental anyways.

After Kakashi's defensive measure, Anko and Kakashi checked their surroundings. But it seemed like the two opponents had disappeared.

Anko put her hands together, index fingers and middle fingers together and up. Her vision became conjoined with the vision of her previously released snake.

She noticed the other opponent Kakashi had suspected really did exist. She had out a paper and brush.

Long distance attack? Strategic plans?

Anko put down her hands to return to her normal sigh. She'd tell Kakashi later, because it was highly unlikely these opponents were done with them already.

She had guessed correctly.

The blind opponent came up from underground between them. Anko jumped up into the nearest tree, and Kakashi dodged to the side. The other enemy wasn't in range, but Anko decided to ignore the fact he was probably still lurking. She had to work with Kakashi to defeat one of the opponents.

Anko waited for an opening, and threw a network of shuriken onto the ground, setting up a capture net.

Then she released snakes from her sleeve, each snake looped independently, trying to catch the blind opponent. But despite not having vision, the opponent was swift—if not, swifter—as Kakashi.

Anko decided to throw herself in the taijutsu, and somersaulted down, landing a heel kick down to the opponent's outstretched arm.

Her kick actually hit the opponent, a nice change from the other opponent that she couldn't get her attack on.

From the corner of her eye, she noticed a sharp glint near Kakashi's face.

"Shit," Anko cursed, realizing that her water droplet opponent was the one camouflaging into the air behind them. She threw herself in front of the now-appearing sword to take Kakashi's attack on her arm.

Kakashi, understanding what was happening, pushed Anko to the side so that she didn't get harmed. He was about to guard himself with his protected gloves, but lost a second.

A deep slice went through his jaw up to his cheekbone.

Kakashi cursed, tasting his own blood.

He stepped back. Two opponents….

Anko threw a few projectiles at them, but some unseen barrier kept them from inflicting damage. She connected this to the opponent her snake had seen while she had shared vision. Perhaps with that brush and paper…she drew barriers?

"Hm," the water droplet opponent smirked. "You still haven't figured out anything."

Kakashi grit his teeth. So lightning wasn't an option. Kakashi knew that the blind opponent who used solely taijutsu should have been dealt with first, but the other enemy was annoying him a bit too much.

Kakashi had seen Anko's powerful wind jutsu, surprised at her ability, not expecting anything of that extent from her. It was probably a new jutsu she was modifying…but could she do it again?

"Anko, use wind-style," Kakashi suggested, and got ready for a water-based jutsu. Recalling his previous experience with the kekkai genkai of the combination of wind and water…

Anko hesitated and formed a few seals, winds starting around the two opponents. Kakashi combined her attack with the water dragon jutsu he had copied off Zabuza a few years ago, surprised his hands still remembered the sequence of hand signs.

The water dragon rose up from under the ground and charged into the torrent of wind around the two enemies.

Water and wind made ice.

They could at least attempt to manually recreate the kekkai genkai.

After all cleared, the two opponents appeared, frozen in a thin layer of frost. Oh well, full fledged ice couldn't be created without the hereditary power to do so…but even just a few crystals took care of the enemy of water droplets. That enemy was fully crystallized, and his blind partner looked discrouaged.

Anko gave Kakashi a quick smile, congradulating him on the feat, and rushed in to help him settle the battle with the blind opponent.

Precisely at that moment, Anko set her trap off, scooping their enemy into a tightly woven net. She smirked, having done something, but gawked when she realized the frozen water droplet was in the net instead of the targeted other one.

A…replacement jutsu?

Kakashi hurled kunai to release the frozen opponent, hoping that the gravity would be strong enough to shatter the opponent to bits upon hitting the ground.

However he didn't fall to the ground, instead, just hung mid-air.

Anko cursed. It was the manipulation of the latent opponent with the brush and paper.

Then they both cursed when the blind opponent landed on the same invisible ledge as his partner and disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

"They'll be back…" Anko muttered.

Kakashi took a deep breath in. "Let's go find a place for rest."

Anko nodded, agreeing, and stepped up to catch up with Kakashi.

"You have new tricks up your sleeve," he stated simply.

"Of course," Anko replied. "I wasn't just eating dango all these years, you know."

Kakashi said nothing, but grimaced instead, putting his hand discreetly over his broken mask to wipe off some blood.

Anko couldn't help but feel aroused by the spilled blood. Damn her sensei…she now had physical bloodlust that he had taught to her when she still looked up to him. "You're hurt," she bluntly said, as matter of fact.

Kakashi looked as though he got ticked off for a moment. "I know."

Anko noticed a large overhanging tree branch. She pointed to it, suggesting it for the night.

Kakashi shrugged.

Anko's eyebrows furrowed. He didn't seem so much like his normal character at the moment. But she dismissed it, and laid herself along one end of the branch.

Kakashi took his seat against the trunk side of the branch and pulled out a canteen of water, pulling down his mask and pouring some water over his injury.

Anko gulped when seeing how serious the cut was, forgetting the fact that Kakashi had his full face exposed again.

Anko reached into her pocket and produced a tube of some balm that Tsunade had previously given her before Anko had left the village. It was to help prevent infection and quicken recovery time.

Anko would have to apply this to his arm gash as well.

"Here Kakashi, use this," she offered.

He studied the tube and opened it before trying some, applying some over his wound.

"No, idiot," she hissed. "You have to _rub _it in." Anko put her hand over to Kakashi's face to help with precisely what she said, and helped apply the excess to his arm wound.

Kakashi sat there, helpless for a while. She snatched the rest of the medicine and applied more to his arm.

"Thanks," he said a moment after she was through. He looked over at the horizon, past some branches, his face turning to the side and glinting in the moonlight.

_This would be the second time, _Anko thought. The second time she got to see his face.

She let her body lean closer to his a bit, her face approaching his. Her hand came up from behind her and slowly worked its way up his back to his neck…

"Anko? What the hell are you doing?" his eyes wildly shifted from her face to the weapons she had pointed at his neck.

Anko clapped her hands together into the sign of the tiger, Tora. Kakashi didn't appear to do anything to counter her upcoming fire jutsu so she let out a ball of fire, but didn't expect Kakashi to be harmed because of difference in speed.

He came up behind her and touched her shoulder, which she knocked off her. She narrowed her eyes at him.

"Don't touch me," she snarled.

"Anko, remember what I told you? Don't attack the comrade?" he asked with heavy sarcasm.

"Ah…so you've been following us for quite some time," Anko smirked.

"Ah…" he smiled in return. "So you do know…how did you figure out so quickly that I wasn't your comrade?"

"I just know," she insisted.

Then she got up close to his face, kunai blade hovering next to his body.

"Besides," she whispered, and dragging her kunai over her tongue before caressing his face with the point. "I saw your face. You're cute….but Kakashi's _hot._"

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**I don't know. I just ended it there. Hopefully the fight scene was comprehensible, and nothing too crazy. Feedback?**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	12. Chapter 12

**Random blog time: Midori's Evolution of Dividers:**

**1)The common - divider. (circa 2005-2009) Trusty, reliable, clean and simple. Midori writes text, and doesn't care about any other fancifying crap.**

**2)The elitist –XIII- divider. (2010-2011) Expression of Midori's own unique and personal divider. Roman numerals are arrogant, very contemptuous. Complete opposite of the basic divider.**

**3)The artsy [insertphrasehere] divider. (2011-?) Midori is becoming creative and artsy with her dividers. Definitely less cocky, but does she really spend that much time thinking about a divider? How pathetic! Or perhaps there's foreshadowing clues within them? Or random pieces of information?**

* * *

**After a long deep slumber…**

**Enjoy.**

* * *

Kakashi sighed deeply, trapped within what seemed like a cage. He wondered if he should even bother trying to fight his way out. The three enemies—actually four—weren't going to be planning to take him as a hostage; they were planning to straight up kill him.

He glanced at the two opponents that he and Anko had previously been fighting. The one that had the body of a ghost—he knew his name was Iki—and the blind folded sidekick—Moumoku. Then he took a look at the third opponent—her name was Hakushi. Hakushi was the third shinobi that was indirectly participating in the fight, though she wasn't present. Her ability was to draw walls and barriers on paper and have the drawings replicated in actual air. That explained the unknown force that kept Anko and Kakashi from charging through to damage their opponents.

And there was now a fourth opponent. His name was Kage and his specialty was transforming into others—just like he did so with Kakashi.

Kakashi just hoped Anko realized in enough time that the Kakashi she was with at the moment wasn't him.

Kakashi looked down at the gash on his arm.

The curse mark amplified the power she had. Kakashi lingered on that thought for a moment. She was different from Sasuke, a bit less controllable than him. And despite having personal willpower to resist curse mark seal state, denied having any certainties she wanted to _use_ the mark to her advantage.

She might have actually been more clever than Sasuke in that aspect.

If she was clever enough to find Kakashi right now however…

She'd probably just get herself killed.

But there was a strong part of Kakashi that believed Anko would realize and act accordingly.

He smiled behind his mask. No, Anko would find out the truth sooner or later.

****

"_You want to make a code or something so that we can identify ourselves?" he asked mockingly._

"_Now you're making me mad," Anko scoffed and stood up, telling him she'd for a rinse and kicked back dirt at his face._

_Kakashi brushed the dirt off and looked angrily at Anko._

_Then he noticed the two trails she had made in the dirt when she kicked the ground up at him._

_Two strokes that made the hiragana character for 'To.'_

_Tora, he realized. She'd make the tiger hand sign and he'd be expected to do the same._

****

Anko had to admit that as much as Kakashi often annoyed her, he had more good points than bad. In this case, she slightly missed having someone backing her up in a fight.

So, obviously, Kakashi had been taken somewhere and replaced with one of the opponents. She assumed that whoever this was, she was battling someone of the same cell as those two previous enemies.

Anko carefully studied her opponent, who, despite Anko knowing it wasn't Kakashi, didn't reveal his true form.

"Tch, you might as well not waste chakra staying in Hatake's form if I've already figured out you aren't him."

Her opponent shrugged. "The thing is, I completely morph so it doesn't require any extra chakra for me after I change."

Anko's eyes narrowed. This probably wasn't the previously blind-folded enemy or the ghost like enemy. She highly doubted that the girl she had seen with the paper and brush was the same person in front of her.

This was a completely different person. And she was all alone on this one.

The curse mark itched.

Opponent Kakashi smirked. "It's calling isn't it?" he mocked. "Go ahead, unravel its power…I can easily counter it."

Anko had to defeat him and search for the real Kakashi. She didn't want a long fight. Her chakra never had a chance to replenish and she had no time to wait for Orochimaru to transfer bodies. On top of that, Kakashi wasn't going to be kept alive long as a hostage.

The curse seal might be her only option.

Quick, deadly, effective.

But her opponent worked for Orochimaru and probably knew everything he could possibly know about the curse seal, and the snake-style jutsus she used.

She slide her kunai over her tongue once again for reassurance. Licking her kunai before a fight had become a habit and she often didn't realize she was doing it herself until she tasted the sting of metal. She considered it a good luck habit.

Her opponent did not move, intimatidating.

Anko whipped out six senbon and wrapped explosive tags at their shaft before tossing them toward Opponent Kakashi. As expected, he front flipped over them to confront her directly. The explosives thrown behind him set off all at the same time, and Anko cursed when she realized how the light from the explosions blinded her temporarily.

She instinctively ducked her head to avoid blows to the upper body, however, her opponent threw a lower cut up at her jaw with pulverizing strength. Anko groaned, thrown to the trunk of a tree by the impact, and slumped down to the tree's base, legs and ankles sprawled. Anko picked herself up as soon as she could, but only stood up to another punch at her face. Anko lost her balance a moment, stabbed a kunai into a tree to create a hold.

She heard her heart pounding in her ears, and her vision was slightly blurred. Wiping her mouth with the sleeve of her trench coat, she retrieved her kunai and stepped forward to her opponent, who still stood under the façade of a nonchalant Kakashi Hatake.

"Harder without someone helping you, neh?" he mocked.

She clamped her teeth shut.

All this time…all this time before she had always been protected and safeguarded. All this time, she never fended for herself without another person's help. All this time, she had always depended on someone…she had been too frightened, too helpless, too weak to chase after Orochimaru herself. And even after her independent decision, she still got help from a fellow jounin, whom she now leaned on…

"Fuck you," she cursed. "At least I have no one to worry about."

"You say that like you don't need to worry about yourself…though you should be!"

Anko took the opportunity to release the shadow clone she had hid behind the explosives so that she could attempt assault from behind. Once her opponent got distracted, she unleashed three snakes out of her sleeves in a far distance punch.

After landing the blow, Anko anchored the snake's jaws to nearly flora and pulled herself toward her opponent—ramming her heel into his gut.

Three kunai between her fingers grazed her opponent's throat.

"I can take care of myself," she hissed and pressed down hard on the points of weapons in order to pierce through her opponent's throat.

But Anko had never been good at taijutsu and never expected her opponent to use some kind of maneuver and slip out of her murderous grasp.

Anko's eyesbrows furrowed, noticing her opponent slip out of sight as she whipped around. It wasn't good that she was running low on chakra. Her only option was to maintain a taijutsu fight, but she wasn't good with coordinating her limbs to overcome an opponent.

She took a step forward, crunching a leaf.

"Bullseye," she heard a voice say.

Then she was paralyzed and saw seals flow on the ground around her, lines all pointing towards her at the center.

"No, no, no, no, no," she gasped, unsure of what would happen to her, but she was definite that this had the potential to kill her.

Then, at the next second, a torment of punches and kicks flew all around her. Her opponent was moving so quickly, beating her to pulp.

She cursed at the pain, coughing blood and cringing at the daggers of pain her nerves shot up everytime her shins were hit. Her jaws felt out of place and her whole upper torso couldn't take a single breath in.

Anko closed her eyes, breathing heavily as the seal lines dulled around her. Paralysis disappeared and she was put in control of her own body once again. But she crumpled to the floor in pain instead.

Anko told herself to stand up several times but found she couldn't.

How…how was she expected to defeat_ him_ if she could do nothing to his subordinate? Anko could hear her sensei's voice…repeating over and over again about how she lacked potential. She was a sacrificial piece, fully intended to be destroyed, but kept alive in pity.

Anko lifted herself up on her hands, but felt a foot press her back down to the ground.

"All your talk is simply air," her opponent said. "Orochimaru-sama had told us you were quite the predictable in your attack style."

Anko mentally cursed.

"Send him a blessing…it might help him receive a duller punishment when I lay my hands on him," she replied. She shifted her right hand, and snake dug underground lifted out of the dirt from behind her opponent.

Her opponent muttered under his breath as he chopped her snake's head off before it even got the chance to strike at all.

Anko flipped over onto her back and threw both legs up in a swing, but the enemy simply caught her ankles and flipped her onto her stomach once again.

Never did she remember getting this badly defeated before.

But it wasn't her time yet, she still had to face Orochimaru. And as of now, she had responsibility for Kakashi's safety. He had joined her in her journey; the least she could do was provide mutual protection.

Anko felt herself being dragged along the ground, and sharp pieces in the dirt burned against her skin. She struggled to get her ankles free from her opponent's grasp, forcing herself to twist in an unnatural position and flipping onto her back.

Anko couldn't see anyway to defeat her opponent. She had practically ran out of weapons, ran out of chakra, ran out of options. Her opponent was forcing her to call energy on the curse mark, but she wouldn't, because Orochimaru was known for having more than one trick up his sleeve.

She decided to go for her last resort. She pressed her thumb against her teeth, tasting blood, and drew her blood over a scroll she produced quickly. As she was being dragged along the ground, she unrolled the scroll, and reached to put her hand down in the corresponding area to activate.

However, her opponent, had caught this movement, and threw a kunai into the middle of the paper, tearing a hole and ripping out a character.

"Heh," her opponent smirked.

But Anko smirked as well, seeing how the decoy of her scroll had distracted him long enough for her hand to activate a scroll that she had hidden beforehand, brushing a top layer of soil off to reveal the buried paper.

The ground trembled, and Anko looked up to see a large snake jaw descending on her. The snake took her into its mouth and she quickly thanked her largest, strongest snake.

This snake was the son of Manta, and Orochimaru had been proud Anko had been able to make a contract with Anda-the-all-powerful's son.

At least his son, Ago, wasn't as demanding and arrogant.

"Master," Ago's voice vibrated through his throat.

"Spare me your power, Ago. I'm sorry it was so sudden," Anko replied.

Anko felt warm snake spit cover her body, but of course, she was in the snake's mouth. What would she expect? But the same saliva soothed the stings of injury over her body and almost instantaneously, she could control her own body again, no longer paralyzed by fatigue.

"And nothing else?"

Anko thought quickly. This was her list scroll summonging Ago. She'd have to write up another one…and she doubted she would ever have enough time to do that.

"I'd hate to tire you," Anko answered, and the snake didn't object, throwing her back out of his mouth and disappearing under the ground.

Breathing heavily, Anko stood to assert herself against the opponent, who still was as nonchalant as ever.

This only pissed her off a bit more.

"You're not stopping me," Anko snarled, raising her hands into a jutsu.

"I don't have to try," the opponent taunted, leaning back into a fighting stance.

Anko quickly spotted an opportunity and reappeared behind himinto taijutsu, which the opponent did not expect, already concluding Anko wouldn't use something she lacked skill in.

But hell, she had to be unpredictable. Whatever Orochimaru had known about her, she had to do the opposite.

Anko twisted her knee up into a kick that aimed as the bottom of his jaw, sending her opponent flying up towards the sky. Here, Anko pulled on some string and trapped her enemy into a web. He fell into the ground, arms and legs wrapped to his body with the trap wire.

Anko released Dragon Flame from her mouth and smelled burning flesh. Her nose disliked the odor, but Anko stayed behind in order to make sure that her opponent was actually dead.

The smoke and ash cleared away, and Anko's hopes were confirmed. Anko had defeated one of Orchimaru's henchmen on her own…

She coughed and put an arm against a tree trunk, panting. She admitted that the fight was difficult. She really doubted now if she could kill Orochimaru. Anko closed her eyes and grit her teeth.

It wouldn't matter whether or not she could.

To die was her destiny.

But how she died made all the difference.

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**Quick poll vote question. Longer chapters shorter chapters or shorter chapters longer chapters? Because I just split this chapter and the one coming up; originally it was just one chapter. Just want to know if it feels like there's something missing from this chapter.**

**Hope to hear from you guys!**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	13. Chapter 13

**Been at a quicker update rate! :) I think this story is as good as finished by the end of this summer! (Though it will be quite a few more chapters.)**

**Thanks for the support, all! Some of you guys have been with me on this story for like what, a year or more now?**

**Midori Fujiwara**

* * *

Sakura looked ahead, seeing her two teammates a good two seconds before her. Sakura forced herself forward with another burst of energy, but she found it harder to maintain the higher speed than the last time she had tried to catch up.

Sakura half tripped over a branch and she tensed up when the two boys looked back at her, pretending nothing was wrong.

"You okay, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked, concern tinting his question.

Sai said nothing but there wasn't ignorance in that either.

"No, I'm fine," Sakura answered, knowing how important this mission was. They couldn't just stop because she was getting tired. Why should she tire before Naruto, if in reality Naruto was carrying so much more responsibility?

An additional shot of willpower quickened her pace.

Sai whipped out a scroll and his brush, dragging ink into a drawing of hawk.

"I thought we would keep undercover for some time," Sai said, still performing a jutsu to animate his hawk into reality and letting the three of them fly on its back as it rose altitude over the sky.

"We'll just be on the lookout," Naruto shrugged.

Sakura felt guilty that all this had to be done for her and apologized, but neither Sai nor Naruto accepted her apology.

She decided that while they were now explicitly traveling, she had might as well prevent any consequences that could arise. Like surprise attacks.

Sakura turned her head to face north, seeing a dense darker forest beyond a heavily mountainous terrain. She could already see Sasuke…he was _so _close.

But he, at the same time, was so far.

All three of them were so focused on looking outward for enemies that none of them noticed they had picked up an extra person while passing through a cloud.

A form suddenly solidified from out of the mist, revealing one of Anko's former opponents and one of Kakashi's current capturers, Iki.

Iki's hand reached into the air and grabbed hold of some water vapor, which materialized into a sharp kunai for him to stab into Sai's lower spine.

Sakura, feeling somewhat of an awkward air, turned around, and seeing her comrade about to become paralyzed from hip down, threw a chakra-infused punch at the sudden opponent.

Although Sakura's attack never hit him, the wind behind her taijutsu whistled and called attention to both Sai and Naruto.

Sai hurled shuriken out with his quick reflexes, while Naruto dodged an incoming attack from Iki, who had switched targets after realizing he was caught in the act.

Naruto, bending backwards, put his hands together to form the signs of his signature jutsu, and a couple of clones pulled Iki back into a fight while the real Naruto leaned forward in order to keep his balance on the still flying hawk.

Sakura looked back at Sai to ask with her eyes whether the hawk was able to support the extra weight. Sai's unresponsiveness told Sakura that it was okay, but she looked over at the hawk's wings just to make sure.

But then she noticed a girl running…in the distance. Sakura's disbelief caused her to look twice, and again she saw the same girl…running on air! How?

"Sai!" she called, pointing to the incoming figure, knowing Naruto was already occupied with the other opponent.

His eyes caught sight of the girl and he squinted in an attempt to see more clearly. But it was true! There was a girl running in the air towards them! Sakura looked back towards Sai to see what he would suggest to do, however being the rather quiet one, Sai only set off himself.

"Sai!" Sakura called, watching him suddenly jump out of the hawk. "You can't walk on air!"

But he did! And he ran to catch up on the same platform as the girl. Had Sakura missed a detail?

Sakura hurled shuriken at the girl, making her stop and back into Sai's kick, which she gracefully dodged. But Sakura still couldn't understand why either of them were standing on air.

Until she noticed a flutter of paper in the girl's hand, and a brush behind her ear. No way…the same type of specialization as Sai?

Sakura looked back at Naruto, tearing her eyes away from an interesting new opponent, to see how Naruto was faring with his opponent.

Naruto, even with his clones didn't seem able to land a single blow on Iki at all. Sakura gathered chakra in her fist once again to get back at the opponent, seeing if maybe this time he would get the punch she had wanted to give him.

This blow Iki _did _receive, in a way…

Sakura's eyes widened when seeing her fist one the other side of Iki's head, her wrist and part of her lower arm right through! What? But no! His body was…wasn't material. Her punch went…right through his body?

Naruto's face carried the same shocked expression as Sakura's face.

The opponent only laughed, flipping a round house kick. Although his body wasn't solid when Sakura had penetrated his head without a punch, his kick felt very real, knocking Sakura and Naruto to opposite sides of the still flying hawk and destroying Naruto's two clones. The opponent left himself in between Sakura and Naruto, smirking.

"Thank you're so good, huh?" Naruto shouted at the opponent, which only made Naruto brush up in anger.

"I _am _if you can't defeat me," the opponent shot back.

But Naruto had already hidden two clones underneath the hawk and charged at the opponent from behind.

**divider divider feed the fire break your vision divider divider**

Anko reached another clearing of trees, and was again disappointed to find no chakra signature from Kakashi or any of the previous opponents. In fact, she sensed no chakra signature at all…and Anko felt extremely alone.

Now the great question: to go on without Kakashi and trust that he could manage himself and let Anko be able to catch Oroochimaru before he got stronger or not. Oroochimaru was weakened now, the old body at its limits, so there was just a greater chance for her to do her part.

But Anko…admitted that she cared for her fellow jounin. She didn't expand on the amicable feeling she had toward Kakashi and justified her reason to search for Kakashi by assuming that no matter how weak Oroochimaru was, she was weaker than him and would ultimately die.

**divider divider throw your fists up come on with me divider divider**

Naruto's sudden attack forced a curse out of the opponent's mouth, and the opponent was unfortunately too late to stop Naruto's attack. However, never did Naruto's Rasengan actually reach him. Some barrier obstructed Naruto's attack, and for some reason, both Naruto and Sakura looked in the direction of Sai and his counterpart's fight.

_She drew a barrier_, Sakura realized, and wondered if Sai needed back up. Yet Sai seemed like he had everything under control, however, as occupied as he was. It was just tricky that his opponent had a better defense. Once brush stroke covered a more dense range.

And beyond that, the opponent Naruto and Sakura were up against was…penetrable! Not even a chakra-based punch allowed Sakura a hit.

Sakura analyzed their situation again.

But if their opponent truly wasn't material then why did the opponent's attack hurt? And why did his comrade provide him a block against the Rasengan? This had to mean there were openings in the opponent's immateriality.

She just had to find a chance.

But Sakura suddenly felt a shadow loom over her. She looked behind her.

That brush girl Sai was against!

The girl smirked, displaying a predrawn drawing of Sakura down to the detail of her eyelash. Sakura didn't like the look of that, seeing the brush hovering, full of ink over the page.

She wrote a few characters over the page and then—

Sai swooped in, trailing his own brush over the picture to ruin the girl's drawing of Sakura, which Sakura figured was some type of voodoo.

But now there was a bigger problem…because the two opponents were together and not separated by distance. They leaned against other to prevent Sai, Sakura, and Naruto's triangular format take advantage of the situation.

So if she could lean on him…obviously the guy was material in this scene…

Naruto seemed to understand the concept as well and charged quickly but was held back by another set of hands, quite familiar to Naruto.

The ANBU from before!

The Pig and the Lion!

The Pig held Naruto up away from him by the collar.

Sakura couldn't believe it! She was tired and she now paid the consequence of having both enemy groups attack simultaneously! She cursed and punished herself, ignoring the leg craps in her calves as she stood back to think of a plausible way out of the troublesome situation.

Shealso couldn't believe that the ANBU were even after them in the first place and now not only that, but also didn't help them fend off another enemy group?

"You guys should be helping us!" Naruto yelled, repeating Sakura's thoughts. "_They're _the enemies! They _reek _of Oroochimaru!"

But the Pig-masked ANBU was stubborn and held onto Naruto, who couldn't find the coldness to hurt a fellow Konoha comrade. The same village shouldn't be fighting against itself! Isn't that what the civil war ended a long time ago?

The other two enemy laughed. "Weak Fire Country…"

Sakura's teeth grit.

But then a sudden scatter storm of shuriken fell upon the two enemies of Oroochimaru, revealing water replacements.

Naruto smirked, looking at the Pig-masked ANBU and then the Lion-masked ANBU, who appeared later, the master of the shuriken shower.

"Huh," Naruto lauged. "Guess that means you're on our side."

* * *

**Just another fight chapter :D**

**Midori Fujiwara**


	14. Chapter 14

**Thanks again readers! Short chapter again, I guess...but **

**enjoy.**

* * *

Anko ran and ran, but all she noticed was that she was getting farther and farther away from Oroochimaru's base. The opponents were smart to take Kakashi far from their center, even if it wasted more of their own time and effort.

She just didn't know whether or not she'd have enough time to get back over to finish Orochimaru once she saved Kakashi.

She pressed on a bit more.

**doesitfeellikeaheadtoleanon?**

Kakashi set his attack against the lone guard, Moumoku.

His comrades were gone and off to take care of other things, presumably Anko, who was probably coming after him to take him out of captivity.

But Kakashi'd hate to waste her time, and he figured on attack at his point would be good.

Chidori tensed into his palm and he destroyed the cage that encased him.

However, the blind opponent still prevented Kakashi from doing anything further. How did this person see? How did he sense…everything…so perfectly?

"When you have sight…" the opponent said, answering the question for him. "You don't see what those who can't see can see."

Kakashi sat there for a lot longer, and then noticed the enemy's comrades region him. They discussed a bit, out of Kakashi's hearing—and sight so that the Sharingan couldn't decipher it.

Anko had been taken care of?

Kakashi's eyebrows furrowed.

"Isn't it frustrating?" a voice asked him, noticing Kakashi eyeing the bars of his prison in a violent manner.

"So this is _the _great Sharingan Kakashi," the other remarked. "How ironic that fledglings like us have captured _the _great Kakashi?"

Kakashi disregarded the comment. They weren't just regular fledglings anyway. Oroochimaru had probably tampered with all of them.

"Well, you're not so quite human yourself, Copy Ninja," another one retorted. "That Sharingan is obviously not normal—"

"Shut up," Kakashi interrupted.

Bringing up the subject of Obito was going too far.

"Here, do me a favor," Iki told his painter friend.

She nodded and Kakashi was now trapped against the wall. He cursed silently as he watched Iki dematerialize himself to pass through the bars of the drawn prison.

"The eye's annoying me. It doesn't match with the other so I'm going to poke it out. I hope you don't mind?"

Kakashi struggled to move but found himself immobile. He quickly tried to think his way out but was too late for the blade that sliced across his face, from cheekbone to cheekbone.

"Three, two….one," Iki counted down. "Good night."

But a flash of orange descended before Kakashi was sent to eternal night.

"Heh," Naruto smirked, while gesturing to the others on his team who held the freshly dead bodies of the other opponents. "Did you really think we'd let you get away taking all the credit for retrieving Sasuke?"

* * *

**See you around next round!**

**thir13enth**


	15. Chapter 15

**Thank you favoriters and story alerters!**

**Bit of a short chapter, hope it's enough until the next update!**

* * *

But in fact, the opponents were not dead. Well at least not the nonmaterial one.

That one was up in a tree, laughing.

"Heh, bitches," Iki snarled. "You're caught in _my _trap now."

Sakura, Sai, Naruto, Kakashi, and the two ANBU didn't see what Iki meant by saying this.

"You're all in a vacuum," Iki explained. "There's no escape in a vacuum, not even for air…" Iki held a blue orb in both hands and squeezed it in, compressing the ball.

Consequently, all six of them could feel the same pressure.

And it only grew as the opponent narrowed their space enough so as they began to suffocate within the enclosed space.

Naruto looked up at the smirking opponent, desperately trying to find a way to get out of the mess.

"Well?" Naruto challenged. "Why don't you just kill us all at once!"

But in one slow action that surprised everyone, the opponent fell forward off his ledge, landing, spine cracking against the ground.

The six were released from the pressurized air region and sputtered, landing back on the ground.

"Boo!"

Naruto jumped back and pointed at the woman who just appeared. "You!"

"Chill Naruto," Anko said, licking the blood off her blade. She looked around to see if Kakashi was fine, and then studied Sakura, Sai, and the two ANBU who actually took off their masks to properly greet everyone.

Anko still held up her kunai.

"Weren't you attack us?" she asked, but didn't recognize either of the ANBU's chakra signatures.

"We apologize for any confusion. But the ANBU were commanded by the Hokage to at first retrieve all of you. However, leadership changed—"

"What?" Kakashi exclaimed.

"Who's the Hokage?" Anko asked.

"Danzou," Naruto answered.

The eyebrows of the two unsuspecting jounin furrowed.

Anko shook her head.

"Okay then," she smirked. "We'll take care of that when getting back at once."

"You're laughing," Kakashi stated.

Anko, who had already set off, stopped to turn around. "Because it's not my problem. It's _yours. _You guys will be doing that, but I'll be _dead_."

**divider divider no pale deception anymore divider divider**

"I don't care that my 'friends' are coming," Sasuke said as he walked down the narrow hall accompanying Oroochimaru.

"Well in any case," Oroochimaru said. "We'll be taking care of the intruders first _before _the body transaction."

Sasuke had no reaction, but Kabuto gave Oroochimaru a questioning look.

Oroochimaru didn't mention that he didn't want his new body to be injured.

He had a different feeling about the turn of events this time.

* * *

**:)**

**thir13enth**


	16. Chapter 16

**Short chapter, sorry :(. The end of this story is coming though...**

* * *

Kakashi stood against the tree trunk, bored. His shift wasn't even halfway through yet. He, bored, looked up at the sky and began to make random constellations in the stars.

But apparently the only shape he found where snakes. Snakes and more serpents, all of various sizes. Normally he'd be able to spot the shape of maybe a dog, but this night, his mind was apparently disturbed in pretense of Oroochimaru, or maybe the heavens were attempting to give him a fortune.

Tomorrow was the day.

The day Oroochimaru would be faced.

The day Sasuke would be retrieved.

He felt a figure drop lightly to the ground next to him.

"Aren't you supposed to be asleep?" he asked Anko.

She shrugged. "All I saw were serpents."

"You're okay? Nothing happened to you?"

"I ask the same of you."

Kakashi followed Anko's example and shrugged. He, however, was reminded of an injury he had to let heal over. To do this, he pulled his mask down to let air run down his face. Closing his eyes, he settled back and allowed the air to roll over his lower face, relishing the sharp coolness.

"Oh, bad injury," Anko said, looking over at the slash over his face from her distance.

She looked down a few seconds.

"You want to know something funny?" Anko asked, and continued, not waiting for a reply. "I recognized he was the enemy because of the face he put on."

Kakashi didn't respond.

"He…he just didn't interpret your face right," Anko trailed off, suddenly realizing that what she was saying wasn't actually funny at all, feeling awkward. Geez, Kakashi was not an easy person to humor.

She looked up at him to his expression but got discouraged, clicking her tongue and looking away again.

"What?" Kakashi asked. "Have a problem?"

"Yeah," Anko said. "You look weird without your mask over your face. Put it back on."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "Well that's one way to deflate my self-esteem. Maybe that's why I keep it on all the time."

"I'm not saying your face is horrible," Anko defended. "It's fine, really, you're actually—"

"—human," she finished, last word stuttered.

Kakashi smirked to himself, knowing the word she never said.

* * *

**Thank you readers/reviewers/alerters! I won't disappoint in the chapters to come!**

**thir13enth**


	17. Chapter 17

**So…just would like to announce that this story has just passed all my other longer pics in the amount of story alerts I have! Thank you to all those that stuck by my side through all this time! I think it's also the most favorited…no, not yet, this story is like third or fourth or something, I'm not really looking…but yeah! Great accomplishment! I never quite expected this story to be big, since people aren't really into Anko and all but I guess the story had turned out for the better.**

**As the end of the story turns up, I thank all the readers and reviewers and hidden favoriters and alerters thus far! I will not disappoint you!**

* * *

She knew they were headed in the right direction when she began to realize that the pain she sensed at the base of her neck began to increase. She had originally thought that she was only hallucinating because it was so faint, but at the moment when she began to doubt herself the most, ripples would creep through her.

Anko bit her lip and coaxed her muscles to continue, even if she felt like dropping down and collapsing second after second.

She glanced at the newer team that had gathered since Kakashi was saved from execution: Naruto, Sakura, a young Foundation unit she didn't hear of before, and two other ANBU that she recognized fairly well from her combat duties. Oh, and Hatake as well, a jounin she had set off believing she knew a lot about, but realized she actually didn't, the more and more she interacted with him. He was just an arrogant and mocking comrade who continued to intimidate her time and again.

She had never expected to form practically an army, originally desiring to travel alone so that she would leave without a trace or a record. It wasn't like she was going to do much more alive and in Konoha.

And now was time progressed, and her final showdown got closer and closer, the more Anko didn't know exactly what her plans were. She had no idea what she was going to do. And if she were going to act as a kamikaze, she had might as well be an effective shot.

She doubted the rest of the ones joining her had any idea what was going on how they would go about killing Orochimaru, or if they even knew what she was up to. She couldn't blame them either, because she herself had no idea.

They had less than a day before ANko estimated Orochimaru would transfer bodies. But now that he clearly knew they were after him, he might even push his transfer earlier.

They had no time to talk, but at the same time, they couldn't lose time being disorganized.

"I want to talk about what we'll be planning," Anko spontaneously announced, and almost immediately everyone stopped in their tracks, gathering into a small cluster.

Anko eyed each person carefully, grouping them and thinking as she was going along.

Well…this might just work.

**insert filler words for divider**

And now it was all up to her whether or not everyone went as planned. They only barrier would be if Orochimaru had already body transferred. Of course he'd be expecting them, so now it wasn't about sneaking up to him any longer.

She had to use his own tricks against him.

Anko leaned her back against the cool rock she was up against. Right behind his rock was the entrance to Orochimaru's case hideout.

The curse mark burned.

She looked at each of her comrades once again; they seemed ready, but tense, and the still stagnant air only increased the stress that pulled on each of them.

They all made eye contact with each other and after a long while of silent assurance, Anko nodded.

"Let's go."

Her bangs brushed against her face with the quick wind that formed when the others left.

Anko closed her eyes and breathed out, leaning her head against the rock.

She'd have to wait for a while until the rest got into their appropriate positions and then she would set into action.

She opened her eyes again, to look up at the sky in boredom—rather, anticipation.

She was surprised to see Kakashi instead.

"Aren't you supposed to be—"

"Just a few words, Anko," he interrupted.

Because he knew that'd be the last he'd see of her. Only he had heard over and over how she had _planned _to die, how she had stated this would be the last thing she did.

"Be careful, Anko," he said, stepping back one. "There are…people who'd hate to attend your funeral."

Anko looked up, surprised to hear the same phrase Kurenai, a close friend, used from almost a complete stranger.

He was gone within that second and Anko retreated to her thoughts once more.

Her life…

She had planned to finish it with the last noble thing she felt she would ever do.

But now..

Damn Hatake, he was making her reconsider at such a crucial point!

Flashes of her life went through her mind.

Chuunin exams, classes with Iruka, the joker of the class that always sdid the stupidest things—later she found out—for attention, because no one looked after him as an orphan.

Each and every new year of new soon to be genin—more and more that she could scare off…the past year had the most passing students in Anko's Forest of Death and the first time preliminaries had to be held.

Then traveling with a few genin to Ocean Country to rediscover her memories and that she had chosen her own path, not fated to evil as her sensei had practically destined her to be.

One by one, one after the other, scenes from a rather enjoyable life glided through her head.

And finally, traveling all this way with a comrade she had never quite known before…

He had said exactly what Kurenai had said. Did they really mean these things? Did they really mean that from their hearts, or did they only say the same things to make her feel more positive about the outcome of everything?

Anko shook these thoughts out of her head. Why should she even be caring about those things? She was practically done with her life. There was absolutely no turning back now at this point.

She could just imagine Orochimaru in front of her even now.

"Sweet Anko," he would say—she imagined. "Sweet Anko, you are crying already and you haven't even lifted a finger on me yet…"

Anko's eyebrows knit together and she stood, picking herself up.

She turned to look at the direction she had strategized to take, looking destiny and fate in the eye.

And she set off.

* * *

**Short chapter…I promise the next one will have more substance! **

**Thanks for reading! Don't forget to drop a review! They fill me up inside, they really do.**

**thir13enth **


	18. Chapter 18

**Slowly wrapping up things for this story! Here begins the ending!**

**A rather substantial chapter if I must say so myself.**

**Enjoy enjoy enjoy!**

* * *

The pig-masked ANBU looked behind him to spot his tiger-masked comrade a few steps away, catching up to him.

"Where's sempai?" he asked, referring to the Copy Ninja.

"Told us to go before him. He'd meet with us later," Tiger replied.

Pig said nothing. He still couldn't believe that they were now _cooperating _with the very same ones they had been assigned to assassinate. Whether or not this would cost their life upon their return to the village, neither ANBU unit had never really agreed to Danzou's plan to eliminate the missing nin—and so were easily persuaded to just help the anti-Orochimaru efforts.

Pig heard his comrade cluck his tongue and give out a laugh.

"What?" Pig asked, sharply.

"This is ridiculous," Tiger replied. "Frankly, we're all going to die in this mess in the end."

Pig said nothing, re-contemplating things over again. "It's not like we were going anywhere with our lives anyway," Pig shrugged, finally.

"At least for a piece of shit like you," Tiger replied shortly, "I actually have family to go home and take care of."

Pig glanced back behind him. "What do you mean?"

"I mean exactly what I say."

"No, I mean…why aren't you retired from ANBU yet?"

"Keeping bread on the table."

"Then why'd you join me in going against the missing nin? In fact, if that's the case, why don't you just kill me now?"

"I don't lay arms against my own people. It's already hard enough to kill others even if I've never met or seen them before."

"Then don't complain! Ends will meet us either way."

"You could at least be more positive."

"You were the one that brought this whole damn conversation up anyway!" Pig shot back, frustrated. He spotted the mark point a few meters away. "Okay, whatever, remember our training. The ANBU is the dedicated special part of the Konoha military elite. It is an honor to die in the name of Konoha—because after all, Konoha is the life, love, and land of our families and friends…"

Silently they landed at the landmark, which Anko had correctly described, having done an aerial scan of the environment beforehand. This spot was more or less opposite from the point Anko had planned to sneak in from.

Orochimaru's hideout was completely underneath the ground. For now, Anko predicted the first layer was only about five meters under the ground. Despite not being able to calculate precisely where the secretly positioned main entrance was, Anko was able to estimate the span of the hideout. If she was correct, digging a tunnel down about seven or more meters at a 45 degree angle from this point north would allow them to slip into the south side of the hideout.

Pig reached down and touched the dirt, running some soil through his fingers. He lifted a scoop to his nose and inhaled, shifting the ground to determine the dirt's consistency. Meanwhile, Tiger sent up small explosives at various points that were previously discussed.

Pig grunted after his dirt analysis. Whatever kind of soil it was, he'd have an advantage over, especially because they were traveling underground, but he checked because he wanted to know exactly what was in the dirt, just to make sure that certain jutsus would work.

After said preparations, Tiger consulted his comrade. "Hatake-sempai is still not here. Do we go on?"

Pig looked at the sky. From what they knew, Hatake was notorious for late appearances.

But he wanted be late for this kind of a task would he? They could just afford to wait for him.

So they commenced their countdown for the said explosives.

Pig and Tiger leapt up into overhanging limbs of a nearby tree and waited out for the final spark and numerous bomb fires to go off.

The ground softened and even sunk a bit when the two ANBU landed back on the ground. Pig molded his hands into hand signs, allowing a massive amount of ground to move out of the area Pig placed his right hand on, a few seconds in ninjutsu what would have been a few hours of digging. Despite the loss of chakra, time was all the more valuable and not an all renewable.

A dank smell of old soil rose up from the hole that Pig had created and Pig looked back at his comrade. "Now, there's really no point in waiting for sempai; we're in."

Tiger walked past Pig, about to jump in. Looking back at Pig, he taunted. "What's wrong now? Scared for your life more than I am?"

"I was just waiting for you to leave," Pig snarled.

And so they slipped into the darkened tunnel, later reaching a cold hard ground. The acrid smell of hospital-like antiseptics burned their noses and raised the hairs on the back of their necks.

Human experiments…

All the rumors they had ever heard about Orochimaru's genetic research rushed back to their consciousness. Fear crept back into their skin despite years of desensitization from the ANBU.

Pig and Tiger confronted each other again, nodding after a small amount of eye contact. They continued to the right, stepped when a footstep resonated, echoing behind them. Not sure whether it was Hatake or not, they only shifted their projectiles into their grasp, rather than all out attacking in that instant.

But they should have done that rather than hold back their shuriken, because they had just confronted the enemy.

"And you're headed where?" a voice asked.

That was definitely not Kakashi Hatake.

Pig went through a quick sequence of hand signs and let the ground collapse into the corridor. There was a limited amount of light and Pig and Tiger leaned on each other's backs to ensure where the other was. Tiger spooled out some wire, at the same time moistening it with some oil before throwing shuriken to hold the oiled string along various places of the dark chamber. A fire jutsu travelled up along the oiled string, lighting up the corridor.

They took a glance at their opponent, whose glasses reflected the fiery light back in their direction. Despite not seeing his eyes, the ANBU recognized Kabuto Yuhi, a more than just familiar face along the streets of Konoha.

Kabuto brushed dirt off his shoulders.

Reflections of orange flame flicked off his glasses.

He smirked, "Betraying Konoha, huh? You guys are such hypocrites."

**lalalalalala**

"This is it!" Naruto yelled, knowing that it was probably his only chance to find Sasuke—to see Sasuke, and set him straight. To take Sasuke and sort everything out. Things couldn't continue like this any longer. They had to straight from a fresh new page, redo and change everything that might have pushed Sasuke to that final step to leave! Return things to the way they used to be!

They slipped down into the dark chambers of Orochimaru's supposed hideout. As if activated by motion, torches that were lined along the smooth halls lit up. Startled, Sakura tossed shuriken behind her, and the projectiles continued to travel on into the depths of the hallway, turning on more torches as they passed them. Final, the shuriken stuck into the wall at the very far end. That was clearly a dead end.

"That way then," Naruto hissed, moving out. They reached a fork in the hallways, and Naruto, without hesistation, said, "Let's split," putting his hands together to create shadow clones.

"Wait," Sakura said. "Would that affect Anko-chan's plans?"

Naruto grit his teeth.

"We'll move quickly then, check all the rooms," Sai suggested.

Sakura was unconvinced.

"If the others have spotted him, they would have signaled us already."

They agreed at this, and set off, running, hoping only for the best.

**itsinyoureyes**

Kakashi was surprised to see that he didn't even catch up to his comrades even before reaching the set landmark. He hadn't thought he had spent that much time giving his last words to Anko.

Kakashi noticed the tunnel that was dug at the specified location. They had already even infiltrated the hideout before he got there.

Either the ANBU were supernaturally efficient…or Kakashi really did have to stop delaying himself.

Kakashi stepped down into the tunnel and the first thing that hit him was the overwhelming stench of blood. He took another step forward, unfazed, and advanced into the darkness, trudging through some puddles and muddy ground.

An eerily intence silence overtook him, and all he heard was a loud buzz of emptiness.

His foot bumped into something solid.

Kakashi flicked up his hitai-ite, exposing the Sharingan to the sights that lay in the dark.

Two dead bodies, both recognizably as the two ANBU had been working with.

_Too late_, he realized as his awareness rose experimentally.

Kakashi quickly took a glance at the ANBU. He wiped his feet, bloody against the dirt of the ground. If those two were found by the enemy…what of Anko? What of Naruto and Sakura? What could he expect?

After the visual autopsy, Kakashi concluded the methods of the assassinations and moved on. His accuracy was astounding, but Kakashi had overlooked one single fact.

He had walked off, and as he did so, one of the dead ANBU bodies slowly rose…

**bringmetolife**

"Heh," Anko breathed out, admiring the large barrier door to Orochimaru's hideout. "Don't fuck around with me." She took a step back, gathering chakra into her right fist before slamming it down at the entrance, making sure to create noise and a whole lot of attention.

She stepped into the hideout.

This was it.

Now all he had to do was to come up to see who the hell broke down his door so conspicuously.

She tested the air for any chakra tracks. None of them were fresh and from only this information it appeared that no one had stepped anywhere near this hideout in ages.

But Anko knew better.

"Where the hell are you…Orochimaru," she muttered quietly, sweeping her eyes left and right as she walked into the depths of the corridor. Fear was imminent; Anko could tell she was scared, but there was another more calm, vengeful, reckless emotion overriding it all.

Loudly, she called out again: "Where the fuck are you, Orochimaru!"

She detected a slight breeze within the same time she had cursed his name. Her head instinctively turned toward the movement, but her opposite hand flicked a kunai out to the side her head wasn't looking.

This was definitely no time to be joking around or screwing up. Her mission ended here, and her reputation would be set from here on.

But, to her surprise, nothing attacked her, and the breeze that she had sensed beforehand hadn't ceased, rather continuous. Perhaps the extra wind was natural within the halls? Did that mean there was yet another opening nearby? Anko hastily took note of that direction, and saw that the wind was blowing against her.

This meant her scent would waft over to potential enemies _behind _her!

But fortunately, Anko had taken the precaution to nullify her chakra signature and scent. She had to make sure that no one would stop for her—not even her comrades.

Anko soon reached a part of the corridor that tailored off into a sharp corner. Anko edged against he wall and peeked behind the corner. It was dark and she saw nothing, but noticed the breeze got stronger, and that her footsteps made echoes.

She searched thoroughly for the extra opening that she presumed to be there. Anko, sure enough, discovered some small twisted staircase flying down another level of the hideout.

She took the last breath of fresher air before descending.

**aheadtoleanon?**

Sakura, despite knowing the advantages of her three person cell, was worried again. She was concerned that nothing had come across them, actually. No enemies had interrupted their ravage search for Sasuke just yet, and they were covering a large amount of area.

They didn't come across anything but doors, turns, and many dead ends. There was no doubt that the hideout was constructed a maze.

It was hard to navigate without idea of how large or wide the area was, and what jutsus may be altering the environment. Hell, for all she knew, they could have been riding along a genjutsu this entire time!

Sakura forced her mind to blank out, later opening her eyes and looking around again.

Fortunately, her hunches told her that they weren't under any genjutsus. Nothing was strange, predictable, patterned, or out of place. Things seemed too realistic to be anything but reality. But she could only hope that her instincts were right.

She glanced at Naruto, who was practically three steps ahead of Sai and herself. Without even looking at his face, she could see the determination written all over her face. She could easily see the brief moment of hope that flashed in his eyes before pulling open yet another door, then the disappointment flicking upon realize there wasn't the one he was looking for, and then determination flooded his face once again as he continued his procedure.

Sai, despite how emotionless he was, had that cool, calm and persistent personality aura. Sakura wasn't sure whether or not it was because Sai really was opening up a bit more, or that she was getting to know him a bit better, but Sakura was discovering that Sai hadn't truly lost all his humanity. He still had emotions, except that they had simmered down so much that the only detectable moods had were through the amount he spoke and just interpersonal hunches.

Sakura actually couldn't tell what she was feeling herself. She was experiencing a combination of nervous excitement, disappointing hope, courageous fear, even dulled thrill.

She wasn't sure what to expect and she wasn't sure what to think. She couldn't take her mind off Sasuke and what she would do if they would actually find him later, and she still realized that she had to keep her guard in case something would attack them, though at this point she was completely certain that her adrenaline was at a high enough level to be able to react properly to any offensive approach.

And then something stopped all three of them.

"Shit!" Naruto cursed, and Sai looked off to the side.

Sakura's eyes widened in terror.

One dead body—one of the ANBU who had been travelling with them…

Naruto stepped back while Sakura looked down at the ground. Only Sai was unaffected, looking around the three of them to make up for the other two's loss of attention.

Sai seemed to have detected something, because he motioned to the left of them, deeper around another chamber of the hideout.

**attheendofourbrokenroad**

Anko's foot reached the stone floor of the lower level of the hideout. She was so nerve wrecked that she almost didn't realize that her curse mark was flaring and sending sharp short bursts of pain through her.

She took another step, pressing a hand down at the base of her neck. She couldn't quite explain how to describe the pain she felt. It was almost like a pain that could be relished—almost as if the closer she got…the better she could feel…which would explain the sudden rifts of pain she felt as her seal reawakened. It was an urging pain, beckoning her to reach Orochimaru—not at all completely of her own accord.

So she realized that perhaps Orochimaru had always been planning for her to come back—as if from the moment he had marked her, he had declared her fate.

No matter—he couldn't possibly be prepared for _everything_.

Anko reached into a deep pocket with her free hand to rub her finger against a small glass vial.

Feeling security in this, Anko ventured farther into the new room she had discovered. Her footsteps continued to echo throughout the empty room, but her astonishment, the room was in no way empty.

Anko saw tables filled with open books, vials, glass containers. She saw tanks, tubes, chambers containing floating figures. She saw bookshelves lining the wall, sinks scattered throughout the room, note paper randomly placed. The smell of ethanol, medicine, and bleach irritated her. A bitter acrid taste ran over her tongue with each breath she took in.

She knew what this place was.

Anko stared up at the flickering dim light overhead on the ceiling.

She knew this place all too well.

His self-proclaimed laboratory.

Anko grit her teeth in defiance to another wave of pain that emitted from her neck.

She took a few more steps and noticed long and thin shadows passing along the floor. She was not sure whether these movements were because of the light effects from the awkward lighting or extra shapes from the living figures that swam within the tanks and glass chambers, or if it was someone stalking her…lurking…

Once she had considered this place to be the most enlightening location she had ever worked in. But that was when Orochimaru was her father, her instructor, her guide, her role model, her sensei…

Her hand fingered the tiny glass vial within her pocket, comfort dragging from the touch of the smooth surface.

"Come on out, Orochimaru! Where the _fuck _are you?" she yelled, bitter.

She stepped around deeper into the lab, before repeating. "Where in hell are you?"

"Anko…have you forgotten my teaching already?"

Her body froze, and never had she felt a cold ice run through her bones like it did that moment she suddenly felt _his _presence behind her.

"One of my first lessons taught you to never trust your back…"

* * *

**Anyways, thank you guys so much for the ongoing support of this story! My houseplants are doing quite well, btw, for those that were curious. They are green and looking great as ever, making O2 for my room.**

**thir13enth**


	19. Chapter 19

**Okay then peeps...going around to the end...I'm guessing that this story has about 7 more chapters left.**

**Hm...anything special going on? Not really, I just started to get into Bleach, after some peer pressure and resisting for quite awhile, so now I have yet another story to learn about and all. Anyways, my plants are doing just great and my room is rather messier than usual, so I should probably get to that next.**

**To ankofan: Thanks for the review! And fortunately for you, this story is now updated!**

* * *

That's when Kakashi caught the slightest hint of Anko's chakra signature.

He looked down the stairway to the left of him.

"Where the fuck are you, Orochimaru?" her voice yelled, distant but all the same there.

Kakashi quickly started down the steps, about to respond to her, but then whipped around to block an incoming senbon between his fingers.

"She had already stated that this was going to be _her _fight, hadn't she?" Kabuto reminded Kakashi.

Kakashi didn't respond, but his eyebrows furrowed, Sharingan focusing on Kabuto's figure.

"So that means your fight is mine," Kabuto concluded. "An honor, I must say."

**darkerthanblack**

Sakura was first to detect Kakashi.

"Sensei!" she exclaimed in relief. "He's still okay!"

"Where?" Naruto urgently asked, still looking down another hallway to check for Sasuke.

But in truth, Sakura didn't know where Kakashi's chakra was coming from. Actually, she wasn't able to detect it any longer, and she hoped to hell that it wasn't her imagination from the very beginning, a indication that maybe she was thinking too optimistically.

Sakura decided to take a left turn however, and the other two followed her down the winding narrow hall, all the while checking each niche for anyone they recognized.

"Stop," Sai suddenly warned. His comrades respected his demand and Sai threw a kunai directly ahead of them, which activated a trap where the hallway ground dropped down into unknown depths.

Naruto looked over the edge to inspect what might be down there.

"Look, there's like some kind of a hidden passageway down there," Naruto said. "I'll go in."

"No, Naruto, I'm not letting you throw yourself into a trap," Sakura disagreed, her eyes flashing worry. "I'm not about to lose you as well." Sakura pulled Naruto back by the shoulder, but leaned slightly past the edge, herself curious as well.

"I'll go down there," she volunteered, and looked back up at the two guys. "You guys need to back me up."

Naruto was about to protest, not willing to let Sakura put herself right in front of him, when it was obvious that he should have been the one risking, and not her. But Sakura finalized her decision without a look back, jumping down in the black depths of the trap.

Sai and Naruto could only follow after.

To their surprise, they landed into a pool of very dense liquid. After resurfacing and taking deep breaths of the dank air, they hauled themselves out of the dense water, clothes soaked and heavy against their skin.

They observed their surroundings. It looked like a small chamber of only tanks that were obviously filled with the same substance.

Sakura flipped her bands over her forehead to push them out of her eyes, scanning the new surroundings.

"Where are we?" she asked.

"You're asking me?" Naruto muttered.

Sai turned around to make up for his teammates that were looking the opposite direction.

And even _he _was disturbed at what he saw under the light.

Sakura gasped when she also turned, and Naruto held a curse on his tongue.

A stripped male was chained down against the wall, skin missing, muscles and bones exposed.

Still alive.

They could see his heart beating, and his lungs expanding with every breath he took.

Sakura was first to look away and began to swim away, hoping not to see anything more grosteque than what had been right in front of them. The other two followed her example.

Eventually they reached some kind of a shore, and pulled themselves out of the water onto the tiled pavement. Continuing to walk, they soon came across a more clear part of the room. Sakura could see nothing beyond the large tanks that surrounded the room and assumed that they were now in a completely sealed off and enclosed room.

Oh, but there was an opening behind one of the tanks off to the side, and they walked on over there.

Behind them, someone intentionally clomped down a foot so that the three of them could acknowledge the person's presense.

Naruto reacted first, metal weapons clinking together in his palms.

His expression transformed into shock.

"S-Sasuke!"

* * *

**Oh. It's chicken butt head!**

**By the way, you guys should all definitely check out this anime called Darker than Black. It's quite the gem of a series, and all the episodes are available on Hulu (the only drawback is that it's "mature" content because of the blood and slightly-though I would say barely-suggestive themes) and you might have to sign up for a Hulu thing or whatever, but it's free!) and on Youtube from Funimation!**

**It's awesome, unique, but might take a bit of watching to get all the explanations and everything down! The drum n bass soundtrack is addicting as well! Try Darker than Black out! I'm trying to promote it primarily because it's great but not too many people know it! (It's fandom has only 350-ish stories! I was expecting at least 3K at bare minimum!)**

**Anyways, check Darker than Black out! If you need a fan to discuss it with you, I'm right here!**

**Oh, and of course, review as always! **

**thir13enth**


	20. Chapter 20

**Infinity Comes To A End made my day a few days ago. A quick shoutout to him for checking out Darker than Black!**

**Sorry about the shortness of this chapter! *ducks thrown rotten tomatoes***

* * *

Almost as if he were mocking her, Orochimaru allowed Anko to go first. Not taking this implicit insult personally, she took the chance to make a hit almost recklessly.

Now was her moment to shine. Now, she had only one objective-and she would give everything to get that down.

Anko swirled around, throwing her heel at her former sensei, easily dodged her offensive attack. It was only too bad that she was fighting her own sensei; he would know the extent of her abilities, and he would know how she fought more than anyone else, while she had no real idea exactly what her own sensei was capable of doing.

His swiftness almost surprised her; his body was so old and messed up that she had doubted he could stand on his own. What truly frightened her however, would be the variety of jutsus that she knew he could perform.

But she continued to try to get at least one hit on him, her taijutsu suddenly much better than she had ever seen herself.

"Why Anko, I am surprised you would even want to injure me," Orochimaru stated, but Anko was pretty damn well sure that was sarcasm.

"You're not who I used to believe you were," she snarled, attempting to land several more blows. Anko was quite aware that Orochimaru had still not made one independent move yet, gliding to only dodge her frantic taijutsu that grew more and more desperate with every miss.

Adrenaline surged through her body and she found herself quickening in speed. Round after round of attacking one way and another, her kunai finally was faster than her sensei and a few locks of his hair were cut off straight.

Both student and mentor froze, and Anko smirked.

"You really do intend to hurt me," Orochimaru said.

"Hell yeah," Anko agreed, but before she could land a finishing slice over his eyes, he pulled at one of the bandages that were covering the rest of his face.

Those wrappings dropped to the ground.

"Are you sure?" Orochimaru mocked, relishing the surprise on Anko's face when she saw the face underneath the bandages.

"No..." Anko gasped, staring at the face of her brother looking back at her.

* * *

**Slight twist with a hint of OC. **

**thir13enth**


	21. Chapter 21

**Slightly longer chapter than the others, enjoy!**

* * *

After several more senbon came at him, only centimeters away from his face, Kakashi decided that his approach wasn't working to effectively. Kabuto had still not used any one of the jutsus that Kakashi was confident that Kabuto knew. All the medical genius had used so far were kunai, senbon, and paper bombs.

His close combat atacks were quick however, and Kakashi still hadn't gotten a chance to initiate any of his own jutsu. Kakashi knew Kabuto was doing this on purpose: keeping Kakashi's eyes occupied on what was going on in front of him would prevent Kakshi from keeping track of whatever else was going on, particularily with Anko just one level below them.

Kakashi, after doing some quick calculations, formed two shadow clones when Kabuto's next paper bomb scroll shot up fire and smoke, hiding the clones behind the corners of the hallway. His clones minded their own business while Kakashi continued to fight hand to hand.

Kabuto stabbed him in the thigh, and paralysis began to crawl up Kakashi's right leg and Kakashi placed his hands together to vanish in a cloud of smoke, letting a clone jump into his place while he covered the scent of his own blood, his real body disappearing a bit farther off.

Breathing deeply, Kakashi knew he was being stupid, to not have been thinking about his own sake, instead keeping his mind occupied with worry over his students and Anko.

He sculpted his hands into quick seals and held his right hand down to build Chidori, before using the extra chakra to speed up his advance from behind against Kabuto, who was occupied with one of his clones.

Kakashi was successful in searing Kabuto's arm from the rest of his torso.

Kakashi thought a bit.

Obviously the Kabuto in front of him wasn't a clone...so why wasn't Kabuto concerned that his arm had just been ripped off? Was there a trick behind all this?

Kakashi stepped back, back on one of his clones. The other clone that hadn't exposed itself yet was still lurking somewhere else, waiting for its turn.

Kabuto grimaced at the sight of his own blood, but did nothing about his misfortunate, using his other hand to push up his glasses and refocus them.

"I'm sorry, Kakashi Hatake," Kabuto said, with a tone of genuinely sincere respect that creeped Kakashi out. "But I'm afraid I won't be _that _easy to finish off."

Kakashi eyes widened as the stub of Kabuto's arm began to regrow flesh and bone in a matter of seconds right in front of Kakashi's eyes. Before he knew it, Kabuto's entire arm had regrown on its own!

So _this _is why Kabuto had chosen close combat!

Kabuto wiggled the fingers of his regrown limb, smirking.

Kakashi began to figure out what possible body parts Kabuto couldn't regrow: the head for instance, and figured that he should at least aim for that instead at the least. But Kakashi decided not to dwell his mind on the subject for long, since he wasn't entirely sure what to expect out of all this.

"I've had lots of time under Orochimaru's guidance," Kabuto explained, admiring the new arm he grew. "Those experiments weren't just for him; they served a greater purpose."

Kakashi felt a sickening acid rise up in his throat.

"Whatever experiments were successful, I put on myself," Kabuto continued. "Only the best traits can be endowed on me as powers and gifts!"

Kakashi's eyes narrowed. Things weren't looking too well prospectively for Kakashi's fight ahead. Kakashi wasn't even sure if he was completely prepared for all this.

Kabuto began to laugh, on the insane side.

"I'm indestructible!" he cried in joy, psychotic chuckles making up the rest of his statement. He was mocking Kakashi, teasing Kakashi, and challenging Kakashi to defeat his immortality all at the same time.

Kakashi's options were running low. He took the opportunity to release a trap that his clone had set up, kicking the trigger with his left leg, while leaning on another clone to make up for his now inactive left leg, having been injured from before.

The windmill shuriken that was launched decapitated Kabuto, spraying warm blood all over the place, even Kakashi's face and body, to Kakashi's horror. Kakashi caught the boomerang of a shuriken, tucking it back into his pack and hoped that perhaps Kabuto's head was the one exception to all the regrowing.

Kakashi cursed.

He stared, watching as another hand grew right back in place within a few flash of seconds.

**soundofaheart**

"Sasuke!" Sakura also exclaimed, her eyes more wide than even Naruto's.

No movement was made as the two of them took in Sasuke's form, as if glorifying his very image and presence. ALl was silent and attention to all else was sacrificed and given to him alone.

Wordless, all four of them stood, staring at one another, memories wheeling before their eyes of what was before all the changes that time had brought them apart.

Sakura, Naruto, and Sasuke...of what once was...down to this very moment, Sasuke was only a fading memory, a legend that could never quite seem to be caught...

Sasuke broke the eye contact first, eyes hardening like cold glass. He took a single step and disappeared with one push of his foot.

But Naruto reacted just as quickly.

"No! You're not fucking leaving us again!" Naruto objected, tearing off at high speeds to where Sasuke had stood. "_Sasuke! _You can't do this after all the shit we've been through-"

A glistening, beautifully crafted sword dragged a crimson line along Naruto's throat, caressing the soft skin.

Sasuke's smooth voice filled the empty room with authority.

"I came here as a sacrifice in order to keep you alive," Sasuke said. "And I can just as easily break that guarantee."

Before Naruto could question him, Sasuke had disappeared again, and a frustrated Naruto looked around for any openings that Sasuke could have taken to get out.

Sakura's knees buckled and she fell to the floor in tears, covering her face with her hands to muffle her agony.

"S-Sakura!" Naruto said, concerned. He knelt down on one knee, but was unsure of how to comfort her, biting his lip.

How could he even _try _to love her when he couldn't fulfill her one wish?

How could he even declare himself as someone significant to any of them if he couldn't even keep a promise?

Naruto's eyes shut and he felt warmth envelop over his eyes as well. But just as that warmth formed, a strong pain erupted within his heart. Some might call it heartache, but it was much more psychological torture than simple misery.

He became enraged.

After all thick and thin, Sasuke had been with the team. He had left, life was never reconstructed again, bonds were never broken, instead, rather ripped and severed. Everything that Naruto had stood for had rested on whether or not he was capable enough to retrieve his best friend! And he _couldn't _do it! This lifelong dream of living a great life surrounded by friends-now family-was shattered.

And Naruto wasn't good enough to fix it!

Naruto let out this frustration on a wall, his fist colliding with the cement wall, injuring his right hand in the process. But not even the shock up his nerves and waves of pain could rid the anguish that burned within Naruto.

_That _was his chance.

And he had missed it.

**everthesame**

Anko was practically immobilized when she saw her beloved brother's face standinb efore her in substitute of Orochimaru.

Orochimaru...had taken home in her own brother's body?

For a long while she stood frozen, drenched in cold shock, and whatever fighting will she had evaporated in that moment.

No...

Orochimaru, in the form of her brother, smirked. "So where'd did that enthusiasm go, Anko?"

She couldn't help herself from releasing hard hot angered tears. They trailed down her face like fire, blurring her vision, and she felt so weakened that she couldn't even wipe them off. She cursed, blinking, and finally forced the sleeve of her trench coat up to eliminate her emotions. She couldn't let Orochimaru take advantage while she was distracted!

Anko raged: "You fucking _bitch_!" She grit her teeth and brushed the last of her tears away. She wanted to fly more strings of curses and unforgiveness at him, but she knew that there was nothing that she could do for her brother.

Her brother was dead, she told herself. Orochimaru was occupying his body. Her brother was replaced. He didn't exist as the younger brother she once loved.

But she still found hat she could not lift a kunai to her brother's facade, despite her rationalizations, because there was still a part of her that wanted to at least preserve that single part of her brother that still existed.

Orochimaru seemed to be enjoying himself while he watched her expression contort into extreme degrees of emotions.

Anko braced herself and threw her projectile, backing that with a Phoenix Flame Jutsu and setting out a shadow clone while Orochimaru was distracted in the ash of it.

But her sensei knew her fighting style well, and used a high burst of chakra to teleport in a flash, coming up behind her and eliminating her shadow clone with a snake-type jutsu that was too quick for her eyes to catch.

She whirled around to confront him but he took that chance to land double punches to her abdomen, knocking wind out of her with each set.

Her back slammed into an aquarium like tank, and the glass broke, letting warm liquid run over her, drenching her hair and clothing. She put her hand on the glass cluttered ground and stood, the glass crunching under her sandals.

Then the worst began to happen: the curse mark began to activate on its own accord. Her teeth clenched harder together, keeping in any contollable urges.

Orochimaru stood passively there, not even breaking a sweat. But all Anko saw was her brother's face-betraying her with a calm smile plastered on his face.

Anko recited her promise to herself over and over in her head. Fight to death to prove her hatred. Fight to death to prove her hatred. Fight to death to prove _herself_...

"See Orochimaru-sensei? Remember when you told me that I was good but didn't have enough hate? See that I _do _have hate? You just didn't see anything in me, and I'm glad that you didn't," she snarled, slipping a few weapons under her sleeves.

Orochimaru's smile widened. "I'm excited to see how I've grown on you," he replied. "The curse mark isn't dormant forever."

Anko thought to use this accursed power against Orochimaru himself, but thought better than to let some power that originated from her enemy himself to take over her.

She contemplated and refreshed her lust for his blood. Adrenaline surged through her aching body and she came at him full taijutsu force, all the meantime, gatheirng chakra in places here and there, ignoring that she was harming the body of her brother.

It was highly probable that the Orochimaru in front of her was not the real Orochimaru, however, knowing that her teacher was quite arrogant, if not, completely confident, in his abilities to destroy and destruct. He would risk putting his actual form out in front of her-just to mock her.

But hopefully, she'd give him a reason to regret putting his actual life on the line. And in any case, she had to make some sort of impact after all the trouble she went through to reach this point.

The next few offensive moves she performed were done without planning, only advancing by the will of her adrenaline. She struggled to suppress the urges to fully activate the pulsating mark on her neck.

And finally there was one point where she managed to slash a small wound across his cheekc.

Compared to what damage he had done to her, that stratch was nothing.

But to Anko, that little nick meant _everything._

So there. She had made that scratch all on her own.

And since the wound bled...that indicated it was his real body.

She reached into her pocket to finger a small vial, all at the same time, attempting to advance onto him beyond where she stood.

Orochimaru deflected her offense and pain riveted through her body once again.

This time, she was sure she had broken or injured something vital, since the pain was too much to endure for her to want to stay alive.

Anko coughed, seeing her blood spill from her mouth onto her clothes and ground ahead of her. Her mouth washed up, filling up with metallic blood and she spit the excess out, feeling blood run off her chin. Absentmindely she wiped this off with her sleeve, seeing red streaks on her clothing.

Orochimaru finally took a step forward, walking towards her. Anko struggled to get up, finding herself too internalized on her pain to be thinking of much else.

He kneeled down so that his face was at the same level as her own. He flashed her a mocking smile.

A cold hand raised her chin up so that he had direct eye contact with her, her brother's eyes, now black and hard, reflecting her dying image.

"But I have to thank you, sweet Anko," he said. "After all, you were the first to make my dream come true. Without you surviving, I would have dropped the research on that particular branch of seal. The Heaven Seal is on eof the most formidable and effective-without it, I wouldn't have been able to capture the gem of my hosts: Uchiha Sasuke."

Anko's teeth curled into a snarl.

"You know, sensei, I looked up to you," Anko said. "You were my father, my role model...I wanted to be exactly like you, Orochimaru."

Orochimaru didn't seem to be affected by her confession. "I know, but I didn't think I'd be your hero forever. I should have killed you Anko. You know too much."

He dropped her jaw and rose to full height.

"But I didn't tink you'd be much of a threat to me anyways...it was just the people you brought along with you that are the worse problem."

"You enjoy mocking me," she spat wealky before another round of bloody coughs shook her body.

Orochimaru didn't reply to this.

Anko slowly stood herself up, keeping in her cries of pain.

"Never again," Anko whispered harshley. "I'll stop you from ruining the next generation to the best of my ability."

Orochimaru looked as though he had just heard the funniest joke in his entire lifespan.

"Naive, Anko, naive! You're still so _naive_...the world simply doesn't run the way you think it does. Fate and destiny control the future; power fuels that-you cannot stop it!"

"Neither can you!" Anko yelled, breaking open the vial she held her left hand and spilling the contents into the open face wound she had placed on him.

Orochimaru took a long sword and stabbed her through the torso. Her hands clutched the sword that was completely pierced through her.

She knew her last words were here.

She gave out a small laugh. "I'll see you in hell."

And Anko Mitarashi fell to the ground.

* * *

**Need I ask for a press of that button? Yeah, you know what button I'm talking about.**

**thir13enth**


	22. Chapter 22

**Well then, just another moment of writing creates this fruit. I'm kind of hungry, and for some reason I really want that chocolate cake sundae. I mean, I love chocolate. I love cake. And I love ice cream. Why the hell am I going to give that dessert up? As of right now…I am listening to In Her Eyes by Basshunter. :) **

**justme667: Thanks for the review! Here's the update!**

**And lol, I'm glad you guys rather "enjoyed" Kabuto's freak show in general.**

**Here's the next installment: a bit late, but (insert excuse).**

* * *

Kakashi awoke, slowly rising to his feet, or at least leaning on one, as his right leg was completely unresponsive. He looked ahead of himself.

Kabuto was gone.

Though he should have felt immense relief and satisfaction, Kakashi found his mind spinning in circles and nausea filling his senses instead. He wiped some tears out of his left Sharingan eye and was surprised to find a small tinge of red.

Kakashi fell weakly to the ground again, cursing. Damn, he had never wanted to use the Mangekyo Sharingan, in case he needed to reserve chakra. Sharingan already drained him inactive—using the Mangekyo had almost left him with no chakra at all.

He flipped down his hitai-ate over his Sharingan, instantly remembering about Anko.

He forced himself up again, suddenly finding strength and went over down to the stairwell where he had heard Anko down the other level.

Kakashi checked his environment again, checking if Kabuto was truly gone.

But the Mangekyo didn't deceive. Kabuto was sent to another space or time. Kakashi had personally wanted Kabuto completely eliminated but at the particular moment, Kakashi felt completely overwhelmed by Kabuto's apparent "Immortality."

Never mind that though, now to worry about Anko.

He no longer heard her voice.

Did something happen?

Kakashi stepped down a step with his left foot, but had forgotten that his right leg could not bend, and started to fall down the steps, eventually tumbling down to the bottom, where he broke his fall and landed on his arm.

He cursed softly and raised his torso up to see what he could see without having to use his legs.

All he saw, however, was a blood-stained ground, and a sickening feeling fell down through his throat and settled deep within his stomach.

He lowed herself down to the ground again and attempted to shift his right foot from underneath him so that his left leg could raise him up to standing level. A small struggle and frustration passed before Kakashi was standing before Anko.

He took the scene into his head all at once. A smooth sword completely passing through Anko's torso, her body face down and sprawled, looking beaten and long past dead.

Kakashi breathed in sharply and looked to the side, but he hadn't expected to see Orochimaru still just a few meters away.

Orochimaru simply lay there, face down, still.

Kakashi was unsure what to think of his state.

He slowly made his way over to Anko's body, flipping her over, seeing the front of her completely soaked in blood. He grimaced and pulled the sword out of her torso, tossing that aside.

Even though he was well aware she was gone, he automatically checked for her vitals as taught by the ANBU, and now out of habit.

A soft pulse.

Kakashi bent down to pick up Anko's limp body and threw her over his left shoulder, leaving Orochimaru's body to its own decomposition.

Kakashi wasn't sure if it was just his nerve wrecked body imagining things but Kakashi sensed a sudden shudder from under his feet. He thought nothing of it, but then suspected something wrong was happening when a few rocks crumbled down from the ceiling.

No, the building couldn't be self-destructing!

Kakashi murmured a curse and attempted to move as quickly as he could on a disabled right leg and extra body weight. All his concentration was just on escaping the hell out.

But he noticed a small black research book lying on the table off to the side of the room. A million thoughts ran through his mind before he took the book as well on his way out.

Kakashi had gone up the stairwell but was still on the upper level of the hideout. He thought about using Raikiri to make way through the ceiling but he was too late and saw only more massive sized rocks beginning to tumble down on him.

One of those stones hit him in the middle of his back and he fell to the ground, beginning to be buried alive under rocks and more debris. Kakashi had dropped Anko, who now lay off to the side, vulnerable to falling stones.

Kakashi used his hands to drag himself over to Anko, and saw that it was too late for either of them to get out.

So he fixed his body over hers, so as to at least not let falling rocks injure her any more.

**:( Sorry about the briefness of the chapter. I have to actually get back to doing some other crap, lmao. I procrastinated on that by procrastinating on this chapter update.**

**A few reviews and some reprimands would probably be beneficial. xD**

**thir13enth**


	23. Chapter 23

**Oof...sorry about that eternity of not updating.**

* * *

Kakashi had never expected to awaken after that, and was completely surprised to have even opened his eyes to bright morning light. He sat up straight abruptly and observed his surroundings, seeing Naruto, Sakura, and Sai off to the side, all three relieved to see him awake. Anko was lying off elsewhere.

He felt for one of this vest pockets. Then he muttered small curse. "Did you guys save a book that I held?" he asked.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Sai replied.

"Nevermind," Kakashi said, except that he was a bit disappointed since for the most part, finding out about Orochimaru's research would be crucial in preventing another Orochimaru from rising again.

Silence fell again, and by looking at their faces, Kakashi could tell that Sakura and Naruto were upset…most likely because Sasuke was never found.

Kakashi took a deep breath.

"No luck?" he asked, and Naruto's head tilted downwards while Sakura froze.

After a few moments, Sakura replied softly, "He was so close…so close."

Narutos' eyebrows furrowed, and his teeth slightly clenched. He shut his blue eyes before struggling to ask, "So were things for you, Kakashi-sensei?"

"How's Anko?" Kakashi deflected the question.

They said nothing, eyes moving off of Kakashi's.

Kakashi's eyebrows furrowed, and then his fingers moved over to Anko's vital points.

Nothing.

**deadlywork**

"We have to get back to Konoha," Kakashi said, standing up. Kakashi didn't wait for his students to respond, bending down to take up Anko's body. When he stood again, Anko over his shoulder, he looked back at Sakura, Naruto, and Sai, who were unresponsive except for the former Root member.

Naruto grumbled something under his breath. "I'm not even sure if Konoha is a safe place to go."

Kakashi was about to question this but then remembered that the ANBU sent after them were hostile to them in the first place. He knew Naruto was right, but he didn't like the idea of having nowhere to go.

So he lied to himself.

"Whatever, we have our credentials," Kakashi said.

"They'd never believe us," Naruto argued, forehead creasing. "And getting back Sasuke was a failure…Konoha didn't want us to retrieve in the first place and tried to stop us. It's not going to be a good idea to return I think."

The mission had definitely ended chaotically—sacrifices had to be made—and the accomplishment in return didn't even seem worth it—that is, assuming Orochimaru was dead…

"We're still going, come on," Kakashi insisted. It wasn't rational to do much else.

Fortunately for Kakashi's cause, Sai's lack of emotion played a better part this round, and Sai finalized Kakashi's decision by crafting a large hawk in an attempt to make things easier and give them all less to carry.

**iwishitdidntendthisway**

Of course, none of them were expecting friendliness from Konoha when they finally arrived before the village's gates. So they weren't surprised to be greeted with hostility.

"Well…" said one of the ANBU surrounding them. "We were waiting for you anyway."

* * *

**:D**

**thir13enth**


	24. Chapter 24

They were guided straight to execution and tossed into an empty chamber that once held other Konoha criminals that were about to go straight into the psychological torture of Ibiki.

They were locked in, and the last sound that arose from all of them was the shuffling of their feet as they attempted to make themselves comfortable in the new environment. Their faces were emotionless, except maybe for the dried tearstains on Sakura's cheeks.

It was common knowledge that the human body was expected to break into depression when it is aware of its own death, but in reality, when facing the certainties, one felt more reflective and calm, and in no way saddened or frustrated.

And so that they were. Silent, heavy, tranquil.

Anko's body had been taken away, and Kakashi suspected that it had been disposed of already.

Kakashi broke the silence.

"Did you guys even _see _Sasuke?"

Sai answered, "Yes," after noticing that the other two were unresponsive on this topic.

"What happened?"

"He left again," Naruto answered this time, bitterly.

After a few seconds, Sakura began to cry silently once again.

Naruto looked hurt and he apologized, "I'm sorry, Sakura."

But her tears now turned into anger. "I'm not crying for Sasuke, Naruto!"

Naruto froze, and Sakura looked up at him to see if he had understood her, but buried her face in her hands before she could tell if he realized that she was actually crying for _him _and how _Naruto _was taking the entire burden on himself to get Sasuke only because _she _wanted to see him again. She was crying because Naruto loved her and she couldn't reciprocate any of his feelings.

"I guess he left after realizing Orochimaru was gone," Kakashi concluded.

Naruto seemed surprised. "He's dead?"

"Anko," Kakashi replied, as a short explanation.

Naruto couldn't put 'Orochimaru' and 'dead' in the same sentence. He asked again, "He's gone?"

"Anko had been carrying a carefully crafted poison to eventually use against him, for that sole purpose of destroying him," Kakashi explained, recalling the small vial that was clutched in her hand after rigor mortis.

He suddenly realized that the poison was probably what had slipped out of her bag while she was eating, and tried to tuck away as quickly as possible before he could ask about it.

Kakashi continued. "However—"

"I'll deal with you first, Hatake Kakashi," a voice suddenly said.

Kakashi saw a smaller door to the left of them open.

He stood wearily and walked on out, avoiding taking any glance back behind him at all.

**divedownintonine**

Kakashi looked angrily back at Danzou—questions running through his head—mainly about what happened to Tsunade, and about why Danzou wanted to eliminate Kakashi so badly, since Danzou had no real reason to kill them anyway except that they were 'traitors.'

"Now," Danzou said, facing Kakashi. "I want you to answer me honestly," he said with an authoritative voice.

Kakashi furrowed his eyebrows in response.

"What the hell were you doing?"

"Saving my student's life from the hands of Orochimaru," Kakashi replied stiffly.

"What chance did you think you would have all by yourself."

"I wasn't alone."

Danzou shrugged. "Would it have really made a difference?"

Now Kakashi sparked and flared.

"Anko killed—"

"You don't seriously believe he is dead, do you?"

Kakashi grit his teeth.

"Horrible, isn't it? All this for nothing? You were all good people, and you will be sacrificed, but Orochimaru is still alive…"

Kakashi suddenly noticed that Danzou's voice had descended into one he was all too familiar with.

Kakashi cursed silently when he looked up to see that Danzou had peeled off his face to reveal Orochimaru's pale features.

Kakashi pulled at his hands in an innate response to fight, but his hands were tied behind his back around the execution chair, and his legs bound tightly to the legs.

Orochimaru smirked.

"Say hello to Anko for me in hell."

* * *

**Haters gon' hate.**

**thir13enth**


	25. Chapter 25

**A rather short chapter. The penultimate one. **

**I'm not sure whether to be relieved or not.**

* * *

Kakashi forced his body to tilt the chair that he was strapped to, so as to evade the final blow of the sword that was hungry for his neck. Unfortunately, Kakashi landed right onto the floor, still encumbered by the restraints from his chair.

He could tell Orochimaru was going to attempt to kill him again, but rage had already built within Kakashi. He decided that he had to fight to the end, taking up Anko's last mission.

Kakashi was still pissed, and enraged that Orochimaru had not died. He couldn't have expected anything else because Orochimaru was just one of those fuckers that never died, but Anko had sacrificed her life killing off some _clone _of Orochimaru while the real one was right here in Konoha all along? All that time spent? All those sacrifices made? All the frustration? The manipulation? All that energy had been wasted and there was no victory of any sort at all! Even from the very start!

So when Orochimaru lifted his sword once again, Kakashi was sure to throw himself in front of the blade and turn in time to let the sword cut the binding for him.

Having released himself, Kakashi drew his body into a fighting stance, standing up against the opposite side of the room as Orochimaru. He tipped his hitai-ate up, focusing the Sharingan directly at Orochimaru, death curses written over his eyes—yet Orochimaru didn't seem one bit disturbed.

"If anything," Orochimaru mused. "I should be more pissed at you than you are enraged at me. Simply because my prodigy is now lost and I cannot resurrect within him."

"Good," Kakashi replied. "At least I got something out of all this shit."

Orochimaru smiled. "But no matter; after all you're heir to the Uchiha Obito Sharingan anyways—even if you haven't developed under my guidance, you're still a good carrier…and I'd start off with a better reputation under your disguise."

Kakashi had already formed his jutsu hand signs during Orochimaru's talk and thrust his modified Chidori ahead of him.

Rather than the ball of Lightening chakra following his hand, his newly formed jutsu took the shape of a dog and charged at Orochimaru—at lightening speed, naturally.

He called it Lightening Hound.

Orochimaru put his left hand out and simply stopped it, as if nothing happened.

Almost as if his hand had stopped the current.

Orochimaru seemed impressed. "I see new jutsu every day, don't I? Anko had even developed several of her own jutsu while she had departed from my path."

Orochimaru folded his hands together.

"Yet, I'm so disappointed because all of you never learn that truly, my approach is the correct path to take. Rather than war, death, and destruction, learn all that you can, sacrifice for the sake of scientific research, discover the true limits of human nature…and break past them! Extend life and create the superhuman!"

Kakashi was distinctly reminded of Kabuto's experimentation for the same reasons as Orochimaru's.

He was disgusted.

"I see contempt in your eyes," Orochimaru smirked. "Truly, you will never understand."

"So be it," Kakashi snarled.

"But you won't be too bad of a host after all."

Orochimaru's mouth ejected a large amount of white chakra. The body of Orochimaru dropped to the floor, instantly decomposing but now a large white snake spirit loomed over Kakashi.

What the hell was this? Kakashi prepared another Lightening Hound while he focused his Sharingan on the snake.

But what the Sharingan detected was completely unlike whatever Kakashi had expected.

No, Orochimaru's white snake spirit was not his chakra at all! In fact it was a void of _no _chakra that was trying to suck in any extra chakra!

What the hell had Orochimaru become?

He was now literally nothing!

How was it that his will was still alive?

Ninjutsu would be ineffective; it would just be absorbed. Taijutsu and genjutsu were completely out of the question…and self defense would get him nowhere, because eventually he would use all of his chakra.

Kakashi still couldn't understand how Orochimaru's _negative _chakra still supplied him enough energy to move on its own, even without the body.

Now what to do?

Orochimaru cackled, upon seeing Kakashi's helplessness.

Then Orochimaru lunged at Kakashi.

Kakashi closed his eyes, apologizing…

A voice from behind them spoke up.

"It's long been past your time…Orochimaru-sensei."

* * *

**thir13enth**


	26. Chapter 26

**Alright guys, you've made it with me ALL the way to the end. Take a breath and pat yourself on the break for me. THANK YOU.**

**Your support has made it all the worthwhile. I am humbled.**

**Enjoy. I present the _final _installment of Blade.**

* * *

"Sasuke?" Kakashi exclaimed, but his breath was already taken away.

The sight of Sasuke—after what, over two years?—had made such a difference...was he still the same person he knew…or had he evolved into someone completely anew?

Sasuke had broken through the wall, coming in from the outside of the building.

The broken wall left an opening for Naruto and Sakura to come running and see what the hell was happening—and they stood speechless as well.

Sasuke said nothing, eyes zeroed in on Orochimaru, who he had pierced through with a long sword made of chakra. Mercilessly, Sasuke pushed his weapon even further through Orochimaru's torso, draining even more chakra out of Orochimaru's snake form.

"Sasuke!" hissed Orochimaru, who was still alive. The appendage just broke off Orochimaru and the Sannin's fangs came clasping over Sasuke, ready to inherit his body.

Naruto stepped in to save Sasuke first, but Sasuke was adept enough to swing his chakra sword back up and around again, slicing another chakra appendage off of Orochimaru.

"You won't get away, I promise!" Orochimaru snarled, and suddenly, his form split into several pieces, and floated off into the air surrounding Sasuke.

Sasuke prepared a small jutsu in advance, and did so just in time to create a sphere of lightening chakra around him while the broken pieces of Orochimaru all shot towards him.

Now Sasuke's Sharingan was unraveled.

"Orochimaru, you've become so weak," Sasuke murmured as the particles of Orochimaru's form began to assemble themselves together.

"That's why I must obtain your body!" he hissed when his body was completely reformed.

And Sasuke simply stared at him, a new Sharingan eye technique growing over his left eye.

Orochimaru stopped laughing.

A small pocket vacuum appeared next to Orochimaru, slowly beginning to suck Orochimaru in.

Orochimaru remained persistent, attempting many times to break and return, but he was only slowly, slowly sucked into Sasuke's vacuum.

"Sasuke!" Orochimaru cried, angry in betrayal.

"Die," Sasuke replied, and waited until Orochimaru was gone before closing off the vacuum.

He then closed his eyes and looked down.

Not one word was spoken.

Sasuke reopened his eyes again afterward and turned his head to face his former team.

Silence.

He tucked his chakra sword away.

"We've all changed, haven't we?" Sasuke mused. His eyes scanned them briefly, and then he turned about to step out.

Naruto yelled his name in time to stop him from leaving so soon.

Sasuke stopped, but he didn't turn around.

"Sasuke…" Naruto repeated, unsure of what to say.

Sasuke waited for another word, but was impatient; he waited only a moment before leaving.

Again.

**frappuccinoaddiction**

Kakash closed his eyes, looking down until he heard a small squelching sound from the wall.

A snake head seemed to push out of the wall, opening its mouth.

Inside, was Tsunade.

She was spit out to the floor, covered in snake spit. She coughed a few times before getting up.

"Where is he?" she demanded when seeing them.

"Sasuke…finished him," Sakura answered.

Tsunade's face morphed into a completely different expression.

And then all her memory started to come back, after all that time trapped into one of Orochimaru's traps.

"Where's Anko?" she asked.

**hotcocoatoo**

Many people attended her funeral.

Kakashi looked over at the other jounin.

Kurenai was flooded in grief, her eyes closed and glistening with tears as Asuma tried to comfort her to almost no avail.

Everyone else was solemn, heads down, mourning.

She didn't deserve that end.

Was she thinking to become a martyr? Perhaps she had given up trying to discover her potential and her purpose? Was she so knocked down that she felt there was nowhere left in the world for her to go?

The last words he remembered saying to her were: There are lots of people that would hate to attend your funeral.

And she gave him some look that he couldn't recall—guilt? Regret? Realization?

And here he stood, at her funeral—the one place he didn't want to be.

Tsunade stepped towards Anko's funeral shrine.

"Mitarashi Anko lies here in eternal peace, having given up her life to stop an enemy that has haunted us for so long. In return for her accomplishments here, she had willing given her life.

"None of us want to see a fellow comrade like this, but we have to remember her even if she is no longer with us. Let's take a moment…to remember Mitarashi Anko."

A long silence claimed them.

Tsunade continued, "Anko…thank you for all you have done."

She set her flowers up against a photo of her.

The Hokage then stepped back and each person proceeded to rest flowers, gifts, and trinkets alongside a burning candle. They returned to their places, gathered around and watched the burning candle while they recollected what they could of her.

Kakashi stayed in place until even the candle burned out, darkness swallowing the remaining flame.

**epilogue**

The medical examiner pulled on his surgery gloves and secured his equipment over his head before stepping into the lab where his teammates awaited him, all ready to start the procedure.

On the table lay a decomposed body—recognized as Orochimaru's last host. They had hoped to obtain at least parts of the host's chakra so that Tsunade could study them more in depth.

The examiner sighed. "Okay, let's start this," he finally declared, holding a coarse scalpel and knives with a smaller blade in his pocket.

"Whenever you are, Miroku."

"Hold down the torso, I'm making a cross sectional…geez this smells like shit."

"Yeah, but it's only been dead for less than a few hours."

Miroku quickly cut through skin and subcutaneous layer. If they were lucky, there would still be undamaged dermis underneath, given the body was still normal.

Miroku separated the skin and slivered off a nice portion of it for later examination.

"Fuck," he blurted when accidently cutting himself.

"Something wrong?"

"Oh no," he lied. "Just this section isn't good enough."

* * *

**And so here ends the story, Blade. Hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I did writing it—though I actually wrote it quite some time ago on some scraps of paper. I think it's safe to say that this story actually grew out of its epilogue, lmao, but what happens happens.**

**I'm sitting here, having woken up randomly in an ungodly hour of the morning but I am thinking that perhaps I shall think of writing a sequel. I have in my head a few alternative versions of a plotline, but I haven't chosen a definitive endpoint, and I like to work from the end for longer stories.**

**But, if anything, the sequel will probably be called Momentum. Soooo…since I'm coming to the end of this story, I'll see you around—and for the last time, ask (no, beg) for a review! Critiques are well accepted, especially since it's the end of the story! So [insert more encouragement] and write a review! I'll give you [insert bribe items]! Again, thanks for reading all the waaaaaay through!**


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